Letter from NMDP/Testimony from NJCC

Information regarding Senate Bill 1534 - a bill supporting public umbilical cord blood banking in New Jersey

The National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP) is pleased to support Assembly Bill 1642, which would provide funding to expand public cord blood banking in New Jersey. This legislation would create the New Jersey Cord Blood Bank Fund to support the expansion of public cord blood banking within your state through an existing public bank, specifically the New Jersey Cord Blood Bank (NJCBB).

In the past, when a baby was born, the umbilical cord was thrown away. But today, blood from the umbilical cord can be collected after a baby’s birth and donated to a public cord blood bank to help someone with a life-threatening disease. Like bone marrow, cord blood is rich in the blood-forming cells that can be used in transplants for patients with leukemia, lymphoma, and many other life-threatening diseases. These patients rely on the NMDP to assist with locating a matching marrow donor or cord blood unit for transplant.

To date, more than 160,000 cord blood units have been collected and stored on the Registry via the NMDP’s partnerships with public cord blood banks. Unfortunately, the national inventory is well short of the federal goal and has far fewer units than believed necessary by the medical community, especially from racial and ethnic minorities.

In support of growing the national registry and increasing the number of publicly available cord blood units, the NMDP has adopted policy recommendations for state wishing to support the expansion of cord blood collections. This policy outlines a good framework for states to partner with the NMDP to expand the inventory of publicly available units by allocating resources to support storage and collect efforts in the state.

As per testimony heard by the Health and Senior Services Committee yesterday, the New Jersey Catholic Conference stated that stem cells derived from umbilical cord and placental blood already save lives and current research initiatives are very promising.

The use of adult stem cells derived from placenta and umbilical cord blood has been proven to help treat patients with multiple sclerosis, lupus, juvenile diabetes, arthritis, and spinal cord injuries as well as many other autoimmune diseases. With the Catholic HealthCare Partnership; the New Jersey Catholic Conference is working with Catholic hospitals to encourage donations by expectant mothers at the time of childbirth.

The work of the New Jersey Cord Blood Bank (NJCBB) brings hope to those who suffer from Parkinson’s, anemia and blood and liver diseases, pediatric AIDS, juvenile diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and spinal cord injuries.

The Assembly Bill 1642 is consistent with our (NMDP) policy recommendations with the goal to increase the number of publicly available cord blood units through a state-focused framework, complimenting the federal program.