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By Joshua Rhett Miller
Senior Reporter
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More than 5,000 people have removed themselves from California's organ donor registry as part of an escalating national shift in the wake of federal scrutiny and reporting by the New York Times, officials told Newsweek.
Donate Life California, a nonprofit that manages the state's official organ, eye and tissue donor registry, recorded 5,423 removals between July 20 and Sunday, including a record 841 people on July 22 — two days after the Times published a pair of articles on premature attempts to retrieve organs from patients who showed signs of life in some cases.
The coverage prompted the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations, a trade group for 46 of 55 federally designated nonprofit entities that help facilitate donations, to accuse the newspaper of a "lack of balance and accuracy" while reporting on problems within the nation's expansive transplant system.
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In a letter sent last week to the Times, AOPO officials said Donate Life America had recorded a 700 percent increase in donor registration removals since July 20, including more than 2,400 in California alone.
But more than double that amount have removed themselves from California's registry in just a matter of weeks, organizers told Newsweek.
"Just to give you an idea of the negative impact of this story, last year we had an average of 36 people removing themselves per day," Donate Life California program manager Lacey Felder wrote in an email.
"For 2025, we are now at 71."
The recent exodus includes the highest number of people to ever remove themselves from the state's registry of 19.7 million in a single day, Felder said.
Donate Life California CEO Jim Martin encouraged anyone considering a change in donor status to seek out accurate and complete information about the process.
"Donation is always a personal choice, but it's important to understand that one 'yes' on the registry could save up to eight lives and heal or improve the lives of many more," Martin told Newsweek in a statement.
"We also want people to know that registering as a donor does not take away their rights — medical teams work to save lives first, and donation is only considered after all life-saving measures have been exhausted. We welcome questions, invite transparency, and encourage open, informed conversations before making a decision that could impact so many lives."
Days after the reporting by the Times and other outlets late last month, Martin noted the "significant rise" in public inquiries and concerns regarding donor status.
"This shift is a powerful reflection of how public understanding — and misunderstanding — can shape life-and-death decisions," Martin said in a July 25 statement. "The stories as reported do not reflect the work we do each day to honor donors and save lives, and they omit key details that are essential to understanding how the donation process truly works."
Not Just California
Colorado has also seen a dramatic increase in removals from the state's donor registry, with 1,489 registrants reconsidering their wishes between July 20 and Monday. Just 108 removals were recorded during the same span in 2024, according to Donor Alliance, which facilitates organ and tissue donation in Colorado and most of Wyoming.
In Texas, some 4,231 people removed themselves from the state's official organ, eye and tissue donation registry between July 20 and July 27 alone — with 6,420 Texans tallied for the entire month. Prior to July, Donate Life Texas averaged 1,662 removals per month this year.
"We continue to see elevated removals in August," Donate Life Texas executive director Chad Carroll told Newsweek in a statement. "This is tough news for the approximately 10,000 Texans awaiting a lifesaving transplant."
Roughly 1,900 people removed themselves from the state's registry in June and more than 2,000 have already done so in August. If that pace continues, Carroll said 6,000 residents could be culled for the second consecutive month in Texas, where more than 13 million people are registered, according to the organization's website.
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In Tennessee, 1,394 people removed themselves from the state's registry between July 20 and Monday, compared to just 144 during the same span in 2024 — or an increase of nearly 870 percent, according to Tennessee Donor Services, a nonprofit organ procurement organization.
Online removals from Florida's donor registry in July also skyrocketed, rising 297 percent from June and 1,052 percent when compared to July 2024. The staggering figures do not include individuals who removed themselves or declined to register during driver's license transactions, Donate Life Florida officials noted.
"While the cause of this unprecedented spike cannot be definitively confirmed, misleading national reporting appears to have fueled confusion and fear about the organ donation process," Donate Life Florida executive director Casey Hartt told Newsweek.
"Organ recovery organizations' highest priority is, and always will be, the safety of patients and the respectful care of organ donors and their families. Organ donation in the United States is safe, highly regulated, and saves thousands of lives each year. Irresponsible reporting not only undermines public trust, it causes pain to donor families who have given the ultimate gift, discourages individuals who wish to help others as donors, and can ultimately cost the lives of patients waiting for transplants."
The escalating donor registry removal trend is also underway in Arizona, where nearly 5 million residents are currently enrolled. Some 2,560 people removed themselves from the state's registry last month, compared to 336 in July 2024. The spike is continuing into August, as 926 removals have been tallied statewide through Monday, compared to 553 in August 2024, according to the Donor Network of Arizona.
Donate Life America recorded a 700 percent increase in donor registration removals from the National Donate Life Registry during the week of July 20 compared to the prior week. The nonprofit is currently collecting state figures for the same period, officials said.
A final breakdown of state data is expected in coming weeks, but an initial review suggests a "significant increase" in donor registration removals, Donate Life America spokeswoman Hilary Kleine said.
"The past decade has shown that generosity saves lives," Donate Life America told Newsweek in a statement Monday. "The milestones achieved in the number of lives saved through transplantation have been possible because of the generosity of donors."
Roughly 1 percent of total deaths in the United States each year occur in a manner that would enable organ donation, organizers said.
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"That is why donor registration is so important," Donate Life America's statement continued. "Registering your decision to be an organ donor is one of the most generous decisions you can make, and could mean a lifetime for someone else."
How to Check Your Organ Donor Status
More than 173 million Americans — or more than half of all adults — are currently listed in state and national registries. Those who wish to check or change their status can visit the national registry at RegisterMe.org or through motor vehicle departments and state agencies if they signed up locally.
AOPO officials, meanwhile, said organ procurement organizations, known as OPOs, are seeing removals continue, jeopardizing the lives of patients awaiting transplants.
"We urge members of the public to carefully consider the source of their information and to understand the facts about organ donation before making a decision about their organ donor status," AOPO told Newsweek in a statement.
"Organ donation and transplantation is a highly complex and regulated area of medicine. Our practitioners are intensely trained and deeply committed to care for donors, their families and the patients who rely on their gift."
'Urge Perspective'
Organ donation and transplantation saves the lives of more than 39,000 Americans each year, AOPO officials said.
"The handful of stories highlighted in recent media in no way represent the vast majority of experiences of the thousands who encounter organ donation and transplantation professionals each day," the organization's statement continued. "We are determined to discover and address the facts behind these reported cases and use these lessons to continually improve our system. Yet we also urge perspective and clear thinking among members of the public to not unnecessarily jeopardize the lives of others."
Dr. Trevor Nydam, chief of transplant surgery at UCHealth Transplant Center in Colorado, said patients in desperate need of transplants could be directly impacted if the troubling registry removal trend continues unabated across the country.
"It's where it all begins," Nydam said of willing donors during an interview Monday. "It's extremely critical."
Nydam characterized the impact of recent reporting on the nation's organ donor and transplant system as "not insignificant," insisting any factor that decreases the number of potential donors to be fundamentally problematic.
"Donating your organs profoundly changes the eventual recipient's life and it sets a whole new trajectory for them," Nydam told Newsweek. "The process of organ donation always needs to be revised and approved, but not being a donor doesn't allow us to do the transplants that we can do. When people decide not to do that, it puts these patients in a difficult scenario."
That potential change in access to treatment could be difference between life and mortality, Nydam said.
"People with end-stage liver disease don't have any other options other than transplant," he said. "Taking a big portion of our potential deceased donors, there's going to be downstream effects from that and people are going to suffer."
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The New York Times previously defended its reporting on the nation's organ and transplant system in a statement to Newsweek last week.
"Our reporting reflects the accounts of dozens of people involved in the organ transplant system and includes a thorough review of internal records, audio recordings and text messages that have been rigorously fact-checked," Times spokesperson Naseem Amini said. "Many of our findings have been confirmed by H.H.S., as well as transplant system officials and congressional investigations. We also ensured the perspective of AOPO and the procurement organizations were included within our reporting."
The newspaper's in-depth coverage had necessary nuance and balance, Amini added.
"Our deep body of work on this issue repeatedly points out that organ transplants save lives, but to ignore the problems found in the system, which have been reported fairly and accurately, would go directly against our mission to deliver independent journalism," Amini's statement concluded.
Federal Scrutiny
The recent reporting by the New York Times is far from the only trigger for the mass migration from donor rolls. The newspaper's reporting dovetails with a push by federal health officials who vowed to overhaul the nation's organ transplant system on July 21, citing "systemic disregard for sanctity of life" after an investigation by the Health Resources and Services Administration found disturbing practices, including instances of organ procurement from donors who were still alive.
"Our findings show that hospitals allowed the organ procurement process to begin when patients showed signs of life, and this is horrifying," Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy said in a statement. "The organ procurement organizations that coordinate access to transplants will be held accountable. The entire system must be fixed to ensure that every potential donor's life is treated with the sanctity it deserves."
One day later, as recent organ registry removals peaked in California, a House committee heard testimony on July 22 from key stakeholders on how to better ensure patient safety and provide additional oversight to the organ procurement and transplant system.
"The hearing made clear that even rare failures can have devastating consequences, and that improvements and thoughtful oversight are both necessary and urgent," according to a statement released by the American Society of Transplantation.
Update 8/13/25 1:30 pm. ET: This story has been updated with new information.
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