TRIBECA — Amit Gupta is hoping to beat the odds — but he needs help.
The 32-year-old technology entrepreneur was diagnosed with acute leukemia last month and is now urgently searching for a South Asian bone marrow donor, a rare find because the ethnicity is under-represented in the national donor registry.
Gupta's brother is waiting to hear back if he is a match, but in the meantime, Gupta's New York friends and former roommates have sprung into action, spreading the word through social media and organizing a cocktail-and-cheek-swab party in TriBeCa this Friday.
"It didn't become about grief," said Tony Bacigalupo, 28, a Brooklyn resident who has known Gupta for more than four years. "It became about: Let's save him. Let's do something about this."
Gupta is best known as the founder of Photojojo photography tips website and the Jelly working/networking events. He was living in San Francisco when he found out he was sick and has been receiving treatment at a hospital in Connecticut, near where his family lives.
"I was terrified," Gupta wrote on his blog, describing the day he was diagnosed. "I packed a backpack full of clothes, went to the hospital as [the doctor] instructed, and had transfusions through the night to allow me to take a flight home at 7am the next day. I Googled acute leukemia as I lay in my hospital bed, learning that if it hadn’t been caught, I’d have died within weeks."
Gupta's plight has attracted international attention, especially after Seth Godin, Gupta's former boss, offered $10,000 for the first person who is a certified bone marrow match. Two of Gupta's other friends have since announced that they will match the reward, upping the stakes to $30,000.
Bacigalupo said the response has been overwhelming but, for those who know Gupta, not entirely surprising.
"You'd have a hard time finding someone who doesn't like him," said Bacigalupo, who founded the New Work City co-working space after being inspired by Gupta and is hosting Friday's benefit party there.
"He naturally has a very friendly demeanor with a very fierce entrepreneurial spirit."
The donor match test consists of a simple cheek swab and takes just a few seconds. If a match is found, that person would likely be asked to give blood stem cells through a procedure that is similar to donating blood, Gupta's friends said.
Gupta is now receiving chemotherapy and will be ready for the transplant in about two to three months, but the process of finding a donor is so arduous that Gupta cannot waste any time in starting the search, Bacigalupo said.
Bacigalupo hopes that Gupta's case will draw attention to the shortage of bone marrow donors, particularly for South Asians.
"We can help more than just Amit," Bacigalupo said. "If we get a lot of people to register, we can save more people as well. We have an opportunity to change the odds."
The benefit party for Amit Gupta will take place at New Work City, 412 Broadway, Oct. 14 at 9:30 p.m.
