Consider This

Challenge

In the UK, families will always be asked to give their consent in order for organ donation from a child to go ahead. However, in 2021/22, only 52% of families gave consent for their child’s organs to be donated. This resulted in a total of just 40 organ donors under the age of 18, compared to the 243 children who are currently waiting for a transplant. 

Our colleague Katie’s son, Ralph, is one of these children. At just three years old, Ralph is battling a rare form of liver cancer and needs a multi-organ transplant to survive. Every day Katie and her husband Graham wait for a call to say a donor has been found, but sadly that call has still not come through.

Inspiration

One of the reasons for the shortage of paediatric organ donors is not only the difficulty and sensitivity around broaching the subject, but also the fact that, unlike adult donors, families need to proactively ‘opt-in’ to register their child for organ donation. As a result, many are unaware of this process and have never considered adding their child to the Organ Donor Register.

Idea

‘Consider This’ is a radio and print campaign, with highly emotive ads which capture the pain of children and their families waiting for life saving donations. The campaign is designed to raise awareness of the opt-in system and shift attitudes to paediatric organ donation, increasing the chance for families across the UK to receive that call.

Each ad highlights the life-changing impact that consenting to child organ donation can have and appeals to listeners to consider it and search ‘NHS organ donation’. They play on the everyday instances of waiting – children waiting for their birthday, Christmas, or an ice cream – and contrast it with the extraordinary situation that those children waiting for a lifesaving donation find themselves in. The radio ads are bravely voiced by Ralph’s mum, our colleague Katie.

We are currently producing the second phase of the campaign which will launch later this year.

Growth

In September 2023, Consider This ran across OOH, radio, social and press. Press drove an incredible 181 pieces of coverage with an earned reach of 48 million.