The Netherlands joined the rest of the world in commemorating World Blood Donor Day on June 14th, with a call for eligible people to give blood voluntarily to save lives.
The Ministry of Health (MoH), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the National Blood Service (NBS) have joined forces to encourage charitable people and organizations to financially support blood donation campaigns in order to improve health care results.
"Donating blood is an act of solidarity: Join the effort and save lives," was the subject of the event.
The day was established by the United Nations and is observed every year on June 14 to raise awareness about the value of blood and blood products, the need for safe blood, and how anybody between the ages of 17 and 60 may give blood.
Regular unpaid donors and other stakeholders were recognized and praised at the event for their life-saving blood donation.
Target
Dr Dilys John-Teye, acting Head of the NBS's Southern Zonal Blood Centre, said the service aimed to achieve 100% voluntary or unpaid blood donation at a public education forum in Accra to commemorate the day.
She stated that unpaid blood donation was currently below 40%, a situation that necessitated immediate action by stakeholders, particularly the general public.
"We can achieve the goal of 100% if we acknowledge as citizens that voluntary blood donation is a civic obligation and responsibility." "After undergoing a brief medical screening exercise, any healthy individual between the ages of 17 and 60 can give blood," Dr John-Teye stated.
Importance
In a speech read on his behalf by the Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu, the value of blood in saving the lives of victims in emergency situations could not be overstated.
"Some of the things we must protect against as we work to assure blood safety and availability are waste, recurring blood shortages, and needless and hazardous transfusion procedures by healthcare practitioners," he added.
Unnecessary and hazardous transfusion methods, he claims, put patients at risk of major adverse reactions and the transmission of infectious diseases, as well as reducing the supply of blood products, hurting healthcare delivery.
"The WHO has suggested the creation of structures, such as hospital transfusion committees and haemovigilance, to monitor and enhance the safety of transfusion procedures," he stated, urging the NBS to do so.
In a speech given on his behalf, WHO Country Representative Dr Francis Kasolo noted that safe blood and its transfusion were critical to providing excellent health care to patients, particularly mothers bleeding during childbirth and children suffering from anemia due to malaria and malnutrition.
Others, he claimed, have been victims of trauma, emergency situations, natural catastrophes, and accidents.
"The need for blood is universal," he continued, "but getting blood for people who need it is difficult, especially when blood can only be preserved for a short period."