NATIONAL BLOOD DONOR MONTH – BE A HERO

We can all be heroes.

A simple act that takes less than 30 minutes can literally save a life.

January is National Blood Donor Month.  Why is it in January do you ask?

With winter weather, holiday schedules and breaks from school, winter illness and all of the business of the season, crucial life-saving blood donations historically drop sharply at the end of the year.

By January, blood supplies for patients become deleted and in 1970 the federal government created National Blood Donor Month, to remind us of the critical need to give now.

A single unit of blood goes a long way. Just one pint of your blood can save up to three lives.

Donors can give blood every 56 days (and platelets every seven days, up to 24 times per year). Whole-blood donation takes 30 minutes. Platelet donation just a little longer.

Take a moment to be grateful that you have between 9 and 12 pints of blood (depending on your size) constantly flowing through your body, keeping you alive. You don’t have to think about it, you don’t have to wonder. Without thought or effort, your body provides you everything you need. Your beautiful heart beats 100,000 times a day circulating oxygen and nutrients to every cell of your body – giving you health, energy and life.

And your healthy body can and does replenish your blood supply on an ongoing basis.

But what about when someone is in an accident or has severe injury or illness?

That person has an urgent need for new blood that their body doesn’t have the time or ability to replenish.

This is when your heroic decision to donate blood will make all the difference.

To schedule a blood drive at your office or to schedule your own appointment to give, https://www.redcrossblood.org/hosting-a-blood-drive/learn-about-hosting/how-hosting-a-blood-drive-works.html

FACTS

• Every two seconds someone in the U.S. needs blood.
• More than 41,000 blood donations are needed every day.
• A total of 30 million blood components are transfused each year in the U.S.
• The average red blood cell transfusion is approximately 3 pints.
• The blood type most often requested by hospitals is Type O.
• The blood used in an emergency is already on the shelves before the event occurs.
• Sickle cell disease affects more than 70,000 people in the U.S. About 1,000 babies are born with the disease each year. Sickle cell patients can require frequent blood transfusions throughout their lives.
• More than 1.6 million people were diagnosed with cancer last year. Many of them will need blood, sometimes daily, during their chemotherapy treatment.
• A single car accident victim can require as many as 100 pints of blood.

Source: The American Red Cross

What’s your blood type? And how rare is it?
(if you don’t know your type you can find out when you donate)

• AB-negative (. 6 percent)
• B-negative (1.5 percent)
• AB-positive (3.4 percent)
• A-negative (6.3 percent)
• O-negative (6.6 percent)
• B-positive (8.5 percent)
• A-positive (35.7 percent)
• O-positive (37.4 percent)

Remember, the secret to living is giving.

What greater gift is there than literally giving the gift of life?

#NationalBloodDonorMonth and #GiveBlood

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