Inspired by the story of an American rabbi who gave one of his kidneys to an ailing man he never met, Toronto’s Jewish community has rallied behind a fellow member desperately in need of a transplant.
Toronto Event Shines Light on Need for Organ Donation
Inspired by the story of an American rabbi who gave one of his kidneys to an ailing man he never met, Toronto’s Jewish community has rallied behind a fellow member desperately in need of a transplant.
More than 450 people attended an April 29 reception at the Lubavitch Centre of Toronto, where they heard Rabbi Ephraim Simon of Teaneck, N.J., detail his thoughts and experiences in donating his kidney nearly one year ago. The gathering, entitled “Stranger Than Kindness,” benefitted Renewal Toronto, a non-profit organization that acts as a comprehensive resource for kidney donors and potential recipients within the Jewish community, and a local 24-year-old searching for a donor.
After the event, 17 people immediately signed up with Renewal Toronto as kidney donors, said Pauline Pioro, who worked with the network of Chabad Houses in the greater Toronto area in organizing the gathering.
“The goal of this event was to raise awareness about kidney disease within the Toronto Jewish community and also help this young man,” she stated.
The man, a member of Toronto’s close-knit Chabad community, was diagnosed with kidney disease at the age of 17 after a routine checkup.
Doctors originally thought his kidneys would hold out 20 to 25 years, he said, but the disease was aggressive. After a mere four years, he was forced to begin dialysis, a painful procedure he now undergoes five times a week.
When he was diagnosed, he scrapped plans to move to Israel, but since then, he’s managed to work. For a while, he was involved in real estate; he currently owns a small water filtration business.
His life, though, has been far from normal.
“The past few years, I’ve gone through a lot of procedures and had a lot of complications,” he said. “I’ve had many days and weeks in bed on heavy medications.”
He said that while he can get by on dialysis, if the iron in his blood drops too low, it could lead to heart disease. He needs a kidney transplant, but his spot on an Ontario waiting list could mean he has seven to 10 more years of waiting.
He’s turned to Renewal Toronto, which John Shlomo Anhang founded last year, to speed things up.
“I realized there are Jews in the area who desperately need a kidney, and there are Jews here who are willing to give, but don’t know how to give,” said Anhang. “My objective is that any Jew who needs a kidney should be able to get one within six months. If anyone is sick and on dialysis, we should be able to find someone else with a heart of gold in the community to help that person. No one should have to wait.”
Article Continued at Chabad.org – Waiting for the Gift of Life
