{"id":346550,"date":"2025-10-31T22:21:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T22:21:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/346550\/"},"modified":"2025-10-31T22:21:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T22:21:10","slug":"jesse-einsenberg-donates-kidney-to-a-stranger-no-brainer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/346550\/","title":{"rendered":"Jesse Einsenberg donates kidney to a stranger: ‘No-brainer’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201cNow You See Me: Now You Don\u2019t\u201d star Jesse Eisenberg may soon one-up the film franchise\u2019s Robin Hood-esque Four Horsemen<\/a> in the giving-back department. <\/p>\n

This December, the Academy Award nominee and longtime blood donor will give one of his kidneys to a complete stranger, he said Thursday on the \u201cToday\u201d<\/a> show. He slipped the news into a conversation with host Craig Melvin about a recent show-sponsored blood drive. <\/p>\n

As Melvin and his co-hosts reacted in disbelief, Eisenberg said, \u201cI really am [donating].\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know why. I got bitten by the blood donation bug,\u201d he said, adding that he was \u201cso excited\u201d to make the nondirected (a.k.a. \u201caltruistic\u201d) donation<\/a>, wherein a living donor is not related to or known by the recipient. <\/p>\n

According to the National Kidney Registry<\/a>, approximately 90,000 people in the U.S. are currently in need of a kidney transplant, while roughly 6,000 people donate kidneys each year. Less than 5% of those already slim donations are nondirected. <\/p>\n

Eisenberg said he suspected that if people knew how safe the process was, those numbers would go up. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s essentially risk-free and so needed,\u201d Eisenberg said in a separate interview with Today.com<\/a>. \u201cI think people will realize that it\u2019s a no-brainer, if you have the time and the inclination.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Social Network\u201d alum added that prospective donors need not worry about forking over a kidney and later facing a situation wherein a family member urgently needs one.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe way it works now is you can put a list of whoever you would like to be the first [relative] to be at the top of the list,\u201d he said, referring to the National Kidney Registry\u2019s family voucher program<\/a>. The program launched in 2019,<\/a> preceded by an earlier \u201cstandard\u201d iteration that required the voucher donor to name a voucher holder who had some form of kidney impairment. (The standard voucher option is still available to donors as well.)<\/p>\n

\u201cNot only does this remove an important disincentive to living kidney donation, but it is the right thing to do for the generous people who are donating a kidney to a stranger. Donors can now donate a kidney and still provide security for their loved ones should they need a kidney transplant in the future,\u201d Dr. Jeff Veale, who helped pioneer the voucher system, said in a statement at the time of the program update. <\/p>\n

Recovery is also a non-issue for most kidney donors, who on average return to daily activities within a few weeks of the surgery, per the Mayo Clinic<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cNow You See Me: Now You Don\u2019t\u201d hits theaters Nov. 14, nearly a decade after the previous installment<\/a> in the franchise premiered. Eisenberg stars alongside returning cast members Isla Fisher, Woody Harrelson and Dave Franco and newcomers Justice Smith, Dominic Sessa, Ariana Greenblatt and Rosamund Pike. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cNow You See Me: Now You Don\u2019t\u201d star Jesse Eisenberg may soon one-up the film franchise\u2019s Robin Hood-esque…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":346551,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[1582,276,37095,8621,128301,170193,170194,169450,26417,57586,2961,11804,224,5337,170195,3546,4369,45182,6620,20644],"class_list":{"0":"post-346550","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-dave-franco","11":"tag-donation","12":"tag-donor","13":"tag-eisenberg","14":"tag-film-franchise","15":"tag-jesse-eisenberg","16":"tag-kidney","17":"tag-kidney-transplant","18":"tag-la","19":"tag-list","20":"tag-los-angeles","21":"tag-losangeles","22":"tag-national-kidney-registry","23":"tag-people","24":"tag-program","25":"tag-stranger","26":"tag-time","27":"tag-today"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115471114990799607","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346550","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=346550"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/346550\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/346551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=346550"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=346550"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=346550"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}