Off to a Great Start Posted on April 14, 2016 by nkf _advocacy The Living Donor Protection Act (H.R. 4616/S.2584) is gaining momentum. On April 12th, 11 Representatives became co-sponsors of the bill. This legislation was introduced by Representative Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) and Representative Michael Burgess, MD (R-TX) in the House of Representatives, and Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL) and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) in the Senate. The bill will remove barriers to living donation by prohibiting insurance companies from denying or limiting life, disability, and long term care insurance to living donors, as well as from charging higher premiums. The bill also clarifies that living organ donors may use time granted through the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) to recover from donation. The wait list for a kidney transplant is long and many individuals will die before ever receiving a kidney transplant. There are currently 100,269people waiting for a kidney transplant. Living donors— individuals in good health who donate a kidney to someone—make a substantial contribution to increasing the number of transplants performed each year. In 2015, 17,878 kidney transplants were performed, 5,628 of which were made possible by living donors. Please thank all of the sponsors of this important legislation by writing them, tweeting, or posting on their Facebook pages. Contact information for your elected officials can be located here: House/Senate. Sample tweets you can use: .@MoC/Senator Thank you for sponsoring the #LivingDonorProtectionAct & helping save lives – [Your first name, Your city] Or .@MoC/Senator Thank you for sponsoring the #LivingDonorProtectionAct & helping save lives of kidney disease patients– [Your first name, Your city] New Co-Sponsors Rep. Sanford Bishop (DEM – GA) Rep. Daniel Lipinski (DEM – IL) Rep. Jared Polis (DEM – CO) Rep. Peter King (REP – NY) Del. Eleanor Norton (DEM – DC) Rep. Alcee Hastings (DEM – FL) Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (REP – WA) Rep. Matt Cartwright (DEM – PA) Rep. Brad Ashford (DEM – NE) Rep. Bill Posey (REP – FL) Rep. Loretta Sanchez (DEM – CA)