Potential bone marrow donors

Got a mailshot from the Anthony Nolan Bone Marrow Trust: "How heroic is your neighbourhood?"

In the battle against blood cancer, we need heroes. And since you’re already on our bone marrow register, you’re halfway there.

But we urgently need to recruit more heroic donors to save the lives of those with blood cancer. And we can’t do it without you.

We’ve created a cool interactive map of the UK to show you how many people in your constituency are on the register.

So I click on the link, and blow me down if I'm not living in the constituency with the highest number of people in the country (2680) willing to donate stem cells.

Actually, I'm not all that surprised. This constituency is 25% Jewish, and there's a high awareness of the fact people with blood cancers are most likely to find a tissue match within their own ethnic group in the Jewish community, due to recruitment drives by people like the late Sue Harris, for whom all that recruiting was sadly not enough. (The high numbers of divers other ethnic minorities in this constituency may also play a role.)

But more people on the register is always a good thing. Sign up; you could save someone's life.