Leading Pentecostal Calls for Christians to Register as Bone Marrow Donors

Leading black Pentecostal church Christian Life City will be hosting a bone marrow/stem cell registration clinic for the African Caribbean Leukaemia Trust and the Anthony Nolan Trust at its place of worship - The Round Chapel, Hackney, on Sunday 4 March.

People of African, African Caribbean and mixed race origin between the ages of 18 and 40 are being encouraged to come forward and register as potential lifesavers for the many leukaemia patients within the black community in the UK and abroad.

Due to very low numbers, the ACLT is seeking more potential donors from the black community to join the Anthony Nolan Trust register.

An appeal for the event states: "A simple blood test will put an individual on the register and if they match with a patient further blood tests will follow. Bone marrow is a blood like liquid, which can be donated by one person and transplanted into another person in one or two very simple procedures."

A person's bone marrow type is an inherited characteristic and the chance of finding a matching donor for a patient is greater if the donor is from the same racial/ethnic background.

Bishop Wayne Malcolm, senior pastor of CLC, has opened the church's doors in an attempt to help sufferers in the UK and around the world in urgent need of life saving bone marrow matches. At the end of the Sunday service Bishop Malcolm will encourage the congregation to register and is also keen for the general public to come along and be registered.

Bishop Malcolm commented, "CLC is a community church that supports those that need our help. The ACLT is one of CLC's adopted charities, and we have great admiration for their work. We feel it is important that we support ACLT's by encouraging our members, the Christian community and the people of Hackney to join the ACLT bone marrow register because in doing so, they could possible save someone's life."

Although there are 750,000 people registered as bone marrow donors in Britain, very few are of African, African Caribbean or mixed parentage origin. Very few matches are ever found for black and mixed race sufferers on the world registers, therefore the ACLT is urging members of the black community to come forward and "do the right thing".

Beverley De-Gale and Orin Lewis, the mother and stepfather of ex-leukaemia sufferer Daniel De-Gale, set up the ACLT in June 1996 with the ultimate aim to increase the number of black people on the UK register to at least 60,000 potential donors.