Stuffed Toys Used to Raise Awareness About Organ Transplants in Japan

A Japanese organization called Second Life has come up with an idea to teach kids about organ transplants. The organization collects broken stuffed animals. Some of the toys are donors and others are “toys to receive transplants”. The parts from the donor dolls are stitched onto the recipient dolls, breathing new life into once broken toys.

The idea is to raise awareness and understanding in Japan about the importance of organ transplants and donations - starting with children.

“In Japan currently, there are about 14,000 people waiting for organ transplants,” Misa Ganse, director of operations at the Japan Organ Transplant Network and a committee director of Green Ribbon Project, which is working with Second Life Toys, said. “Among them, only 300 receive the actual organ transplant annually.”

In the U.S., there are 7,000 to 8,000 organ transplants every year which is about 26 organ transplants per million population. But in Japan, the rate is just 0.9 transplants per million, the lowest rate in the industrialized world.

Second Life Toys hopes to shatter the stigma with their stuffed animal dolls.

“Using toys as a motif, this project extends the notion of an organ transplant by making it as an enhancement rather than compensation. Therefore makes the topic approachable to everyone,” said Ganse.

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Source-Medindia