Silver and golden commemorative card organ donation volunteers received. (Photo: Ji Yuqiao/ GT)
A new commemorative card, for organ donation volunteers, was released in Beijing on Saturday by China Organ Transplantation Development Foundation (CTF). Interested individuals can register through the foundation's official website to become organ donation volunteers and get this card free of cost.
According to a staff member of the foundation, 30,000 volunteers have so far, applied for the commemorative card. Volunteers' names will be printed on the card and each cardholder will be issued with a unique identification number.
"The card is a way of expressing gratitude to these volunteers for their kindness and charity," Liu Lu, project manager of development department of CTF, told the Global Times on Saturday. She likened these cards to postal stamps and noted, "Though we have service of express delivery now, yet some people collect stamps as a memento."
The card is divided into two categories: One is an ordinary souvenir card with two colors, silver and golden, and the other comes in cooperating with the China Minsheng Bank (CMBC). Cardholders of the co-brand cards can enjoy corresponding VIP privileges in any business hall of CMBC Beijing branch.
Liu said that more than 10,000 volunteers have already received the first batch of the cards during the week-long National Day holidays.
They posted photos of their cards on Sina Weibo, China's Twitter-like social media platform, saying that this is the best gift for them on the National Day.
"I'm just an ordinary person and cannot change this world, but I still want to contribute something after my death. I hope my donated organs can help the less fortunate ones," one of the organ donation volunteers wrote on Sina Weibo.
Last year, more than 6,000 volunteers donated their organs to save more than 20,000 patients in China, as a result of the generosity of these donors, cited CTF statistics.
