  
HHS Secretary Thompson outlines priorities
Last Updated: 2001-02-02 15:43:44 EST (Reuters Health)
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - On his first day as Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), former Governor of Wisconsin Tommy Thompson said that he would make increasing the nation's supply of donor organs a focus of his initial months in office.
In a speech introducing himself to the employees of HHS, Thompson announced that he will "move in the first 100 days to launch a national campaign to raise awareness of organ donations in this country."
"We're going to make it a national issue," he pledged. "We're going to get the information out there and we're going to encourage families all over America to understand the importance of the donation of organs."
Under Thompson's leadership, Wisconsin has had one of the more successful organ donation programs in the country, with 30 to 35 donors per million members of its population, compared with about 20 donors per million people nationally.
In March, after a bid by the federal government to more broadly share donor organs between states based on medical need, Wisconsin filed suit against then-HHS Secretary Donna Shalala. Thompson said at the time that the policy would unfairly punish states with successful procurement programs, like Wisconsin, and argued that the focus should be on increasing the number of donors, rather than on revising distribution rules.
A federal court dismissed the case in November, saying that the plaintiffs did not have the right to file suit since they had not suffered actual injury, but Thompson touched on the conflict again in his remarks on Friday.
"What we need to do, instead of taking from one [state] to another, is to grow the number of donors in America. I believe very passionately in that," he said. "I took it upon myself when I became Governor to try to articulate a vision for more individuals to be recognized and be involved in donating organs, and I intend to do that as Secretary as well."
About half a million Americans need a new heart, lung, liver, kidney, pancreas or intestine, according to the Coalition of Major Transplant Centers. Roughly 70,000 are on waiting lists, and thousands die waiting each year.
Among the other goals outlined by Thompson on Friday was a renewed focus on women's health. "We're going to take a leadership role in this country and around the world in improving women's health," he told his new employees.
In that effort, Thompson said he will be aided by his wife, Sue Ann, a breast cancer survivor who started the Women's Health Foundation in Wisconsin. "She is passionate about that and is going to stay in Madison, Wisconsin and continue to operate it," he said, noting that "she would like to see if she can expand it nationally."
Thompson has been criticized by a number of women's health organizations for his record of signing into law some of the nation's most stringent abortion restrictions. During his recent confirmation hearings, he hinted that he planned to review safety concerns associated with the recently approved early abortion pill Mifeprex (mifepristone), more commonly known as RU-486.
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