Nearly 9,500 New Yorkers On Waiting List For Organ Donations

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — State officials are marking National Donate Life Month with a stark statistic: Nearly 9,500 New Yorkers are currently on waiting lists for donated organs that could save their lives.

Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo released the figure on Friday, saying the state is dedicated to signing more people up to be donors.

Recent changes have helped boost the total number of people on the state's donor registry to more than 5.6 million.

In 2017 the state began asking people using the state's online health insurance marketplace to sign up as donors, leading to nearly 200,000 new names on the registry.