Accra, March 06, GNA – Dr Justina Ansah, Chief Executive Officer, National Blood Service, has urged the citizenry to see blood donation as a civic responsibility to regularly champion and engage in.
She said they should not only see the need to donate blood when their relatives were in need, but “regularly and voluntarily” do so to save lives.
“In our part of the world, people only see the need to donate blood when their relatives are in need. When we do that, we cannot take care of emergencies, and what if the patient does not have relatives, how would that person survive?” she asked
Dr Ansah made the remarks on the sidelines of a blood donation awareness walk dubbed “March March 2022” organised by Kaysens Group and Kwaaba Foundation in partnership with the National Blood Service Ghana.
The walk held on every first Saturday in March was to raise awareness and sensitise the La Community on the need to voluntarily donate blood.
Dr Ansah said there was perennial blood shortage in the Country due to inadequate voluntary donors.
She said with the current population growth, relying on family replacement donor system was not sustainable, adding that, it was proven that the safest and sustainable blood supply were from voluntarily and unpaid donors.
Dr Ansah indicated that in every thousand population in the Country, only five people were donating blood, which was below the World Health Organisation (WHO) minimum standard of 10 in every thousand population.
She said the number of voluntary donors was about forty percent, with the rest being from family donors.
“We want to see a 100 per cent for voluntary donors because that is more sustainable as against family replacement system. We have adopted a strategy by encouraging family donors to become voluntary donors and donate regularly,” she added.
Maame Kwaaba Stephens, Director of Keysens Group and Brand Ambassador of the National Blood Service, said there were still more to be done in creating awareness on the need for blood donation.
She said a lot of people did not understand the essence of donating blood because they were not well-informed on the activity.
“Some people still don’t realise that we need adequate blood supply that is why we need to continously inform and remind them on the essence of donating blood,” she said.
The walk started from the Laboma Beach through to the La Community and back to the Beach, where participants were taken through aerobics and dance exercises.
They were also engaged in other activities, including swimming, beach soccer, volley ball, board cards, dancing and competition.
The participants donated blood to the 37 Military and Korle Bu Blood Blank Services during the exercise.
GNA