Motorcycle fatalities

THROUGH BIFOCALS
By CLAUDETTE SANDECKI
Aug 01 2007

Organ donation makes sense

Regulations and enforcement are needed to protect motorcyclists from themselves.

So far this year, nine motorcyclists have been killed in traffic accidents on Vancouver Island alone. Five deaths involved extreme speed. Another involved alcohol, no helmet and a crash into a vehicle. The rest resulted from driver error and collisions with a vehicle.

“These facts tell us helmet, safety gear, sobriety, experience, defensive driving and abiding by posted speed limits are good habits,” says RCMP Island District Traffic Services Staff-Sgt. Ted Smith.

Callum Campbell of the Vancouver Island safety council’s motorcycle training department notes, “A lot of accidents occurring on the island are speed related. And people are riding beyond their capabilities.”

One inexperienced 18-year-old riding a powerful Kawasaki failed to negotiate a corner and slammed into a rock face. “These victims are often so young,” says Adele Tompkins of the B.C. Coalition of Motorcyclists. “It’s heartbreaking.”

Tompkins suggests it’s time the B.C. government start looking at limiting the size of motorcycle a new rider may operate. She recommends a bike no bigger than 400 cc. during the first year.

Depending upon the stature of the student, a typical learner’s bike can be any size from 250 cc. to 750 cc. The problem comes when the biker is licensed to ride alone, without a coach behind him to oversee his behaviour.

He (usually it’s a he) buys the biggest bike he can afford and, once on the open road, disregards posted speed limits and gives no thought to blind curves. Add motorists who fail to see him and turn left in front of him or come out from a side street as he passes, and another life is snuffed out.

Until everyone shows more respect for highway rules and the risks of disobeying them, we need to educate young riders and drivers, their families, and experienced motorists to the demand for and benefits of organ donation.

Maybe if a license to drive was paired with an application to donate their organs in the event of a fatal mishap, more two-wheel riders – and four-wheel motorists – would slow down, driving to highway conditions and personal abilities.

In B.C. alone, some 400 patients are waiting for organs such as livers, lungs and kidneys. Some wait as long as three to five years, and die before an organ becomes available. More than 400 are waiting for corneal transplants to restore some vision.

Though 85 percent of British Columbians approve of organ transplants, only 15 percent have registered to be a donor. Each year, more Canadians could benefit from organ transplant while the number of available organs has dropped in Canada... though it has gone up in every other country.

A healthy adult can get along quite well with only one kidney. And livers grow back to their original size after donating a portion.

Because 12 percent of would-be living donors hesitate to offer a kidney or a portion of liver because of the costs involved (time lost from work, travel expenses to the hospital), a year ago $300,000 was set aside for a pilot project to reimburse live donors over the next three years.

This B.C. project is the first of its kind in North America.The money comes from the B.C. Transplant Society, the Kidney Foundation of Canada, and Provincial Health Services Authority and reimburses each donor to a maximum of $5,500. That covers travel costs to the Vancouver transplant hospital, post-transplant accommodation for a week, meals, and lost income if the donor cannot collect employment insurance; reimbursement equals what employment insurance would otherwise pay the donor.

In 2006, the project’s first year, 80 potential donors accessed the fund and had their expenses covered while they were medically assessed to determine if their organs were a suitable match.