National Diabetes Fund?

[Guest guest]

Has anyone else here received fundraiser solicitations from an organization

called " National Diabetes Fund " in Washington, DC? I received on recently

and this looks like a scam to me. You have to read the fine print on the

back to find out exactly who they are and where the donations go:

" National Diabetes Fund is a program of Project Cure. Contributions made to

Project Cure are used for fundraising expense, administrative costs, public

education, and program services. The services of a paid professional

fundrasier, Direct Response Consulting Services, are used to professionally

assist them in this solicitation of funds. In the last fiscal year, Project

Cure raised a total of $4,574,843. Its expense distribution was 67.05% to

fundraising, 1.65% to administration, 5,95% to program services, and 25.35%

to public education in conjunction with fundraising appeals. The cost of

this solicitation is charged partly to fundraising and partly to public

education. Fundraising costs include costs incurred in establishing a donor

base. Public education costs include costs incurred in dissemination

information contained in solicitations. A portion of the money included in

the program services category was expended pursuant to voluntary agreeement

settling causes of action regarding certain previous mailings. "

It goes on and on, but that is the outrageous part. Read each sentence

carefully. Their " public education " included in the solicitation is four

" facts about diabetes " listed on the bottom of the back page of the letter.

They obviously quoted these from diabetes magazines or medical journals,

since these are sound bites. The envelope this came in was from <insert

your town here> Volunteer Diabetes Drive. They ask you to help with the

drive, which basically is sending out more of these letters to your friends.

Oh, and if you can't volunteer, please send in a donation. Nowhere does it

state that this is tax deductible.

I fear this is preying upon the elderly and those with chronic health

conditions by using clever phrasing and deceptive personalization of a

fundraising scam. It should be noted that this same company says it has

similar fundraising efforts for Advanced Heart Research, Prostate Cancer

Fund, and The Alzheimer's Disease Fund.

This is truly disgusting...

Joe D. Deaver

joe@...

[Guest guest]

Joe, thank you for the information. There are all kinds of scams in the

world, I'm glad you warned us. Regards, Sam