Are You Asian?

Last week's bone marrow registration drive to find a tissue type match for Alan J. Kuo '85 has come and gone, and most observers (including the editorial staff of this newspaper) have rightly congratulated drive organizers and the Harvard community for their outpouring of sympathy and support. The organizers no doubt had all the right intentions in putting together the drive,; and it would seem inappropriate to criticize an event recruiting potential bone marrow donors that. Yet th drive was conducted in a manner that seemed to contradict the very spirit of giving.

To be sure, there would not have been a bone marrow registration drive had it not been for the urgency of Alan's condition. Alan suffers from chronic leukemia, and his doctors have told him that he has one month to live. Flyers on campus and Alan's personal plea on his Web page detailed the accomplishments of his academic and professional career, and how much Alan means to his friends and family. Since Alan's likely tissue type match will likely be Asian, the drive pushed to register Asian donors. Promotional posters singled out the Asian community, and volunteers distributing flyers around campus waded their way through crowds to zero in on Asians (or at least those who appeared to be Asian). Unfortunately, the drive was only an effort to save the life of one particular individual-but the drive could have been so much more.

Organizers could have actively tried to build awareness in the community for the thousands of people-of all races, backgrounds and occupations-desperately in need of a bone marrow transplant. Posters could have said, "Look at the plight of this one man; there are many more like him who could use your support." Organizers could have highlighted the dismal fact that only 3,000,000 people-barely more than one percent of the U.S. population-are registered in the National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP). (By contrast, over two-and-a-half percent of Asian Americans, or 200,000 Asians, are registered in the NMDP.) Organizers could have actively encouraged every able-bodied member of the Harvard community to register their tissue type. But they didn't.

The problem was not that the registration drive targeted Asians, but that the drive targeted Asians exclusively. One prominent poster that read, "Are you Asian? Then you could save my life," summed up the essence of the recruitment effort. The posters were worded so as to be visible, and they stood out among the sea of flyers that litter the campus. For those of us of Asian heritage, they were also effective in evoking a certain sense of guilt. I am a brother in need, the posters spoke, so do your part to help me. At the same time, the posters, with their message directed solely at the Asian audience, deterred many potential donors who might otherwise have registered their tissue types in the drive. The drive did not discriminate against white students, as some ludicrous ultra-conservative characters have charged; anyone was allowed to register at the drive. But many people felt unwelcome at the drive simply because they were not Asian.

The worst consequence of the drive's exclusive recruitment effort is that someone who turned their back on the registration drive might have been a tissue type match for a person in need. In fact, Alan's perfect tissue type match might not even be Asian. This is not entirely implausible: one of the two individuals found to be a near-perfect match, possessing five of Alan's six antigens, is a white woman.

My heart goes out to Alan, his family and friends--I cannot even begin to imagine the desperation and grief they must feel. The Chinese Students Association, Alan's friends and other drive organizers deserve the utmost praise for scrambling to organize the two-day event during the hectic start of the school year. The drive would not even have materialized without their initiative and hard work. And their vigorous recruitment and promotion attracted 580 individuals, 85 percent of them Asian, to register in the NMDP-numbers well beyond anyone's highest expectations.

But, despite all the apparent success, something was missing. The underlying purpose of a "drive"-whether for food, clothing, blood or bone marrow-is to reach out to others in need of help. By that measure, the bone marrow drive fell short, through the failure of the Asian community to actively reach out to others beyond its own.