The Safe Blood Africa Project: How SBC Donors Can Help
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By Amanda Baker, Communications Intern, Stanford Blood Center
This is part 3 of 3 in our series on the Safe Blood Africa Project.
Click here to read Article 1: The Safe Blood Africa Project: Background
Click here to read Article 2: The Safe Blood Africa Project: The Trip
Think globally, act locally help globally? At Stanford Blood Center, each of these are possible because now your blood donation that will save a life in your community can also help save lives overseas. Our online store recently added an option of donating the points you receive for giving blood towards helping blood centers in Nigeria, as part of the Safe Blood Africa Project.
Donating your points towards Safe Blood Africa means assistance goes towards procuring items like new donor beds. One of Safe Blood Africa’s goals is to recruit more voluntary blood donors, because the use of paid blood donors is thought to more likely lead to the transmission of blood-borne diseases like hepatitis, malaria, HIV, and other diseases. Making blood centers more inviting and comforting will encourage healthy eligible donors to make donations that help save the lives of local patients in need. At present some Nigerian donors have to donate on flat cots lying on their backs (that is, if they have cots at all). Comfy donors beds could thus make a big difference in attracting volunteer donors to give blood.
In addition to donor beds, donated points might also go towards vehicles for mobile blood drives, laboratory equipment like pipettes and donor scales, and other items that will help make a Nigerian donor’s experience a pleasant and safe one. The delivery of these items, as well as the training required for phlebotomy and blood storage, is handled by employees from BloodSource in Sacramento and representatives from the Carmel Valley Rotary Club.
Give blood for life to help save lives at home and abroad!
Update, Spring 2012:
The overwhelming response in number of point donations from our blood donors had our allotted funds for these programs maxed out within a few months. But the donations have gone a long way! Read more here.