THE National Blood Services Zimbabwe (NBSZ) has appealed for more blood donations to beef up dwindling stocks especially the blood group O which is in short supply owing to long school holidays.
BY SILENCE CHARUMBIRA
NBSZ spokesperson Esther Massundah told NewsDay that the organisation currently had only a week’s supply of blood group O.
Blood group O has the highest demand as it can be used for patients of other blood groups although other blood groups cannot be given to people of blood group O.
Massundah said 50% of the Zimbabwean population was blood group O. She said NBSZ was prioritising critical cases although it managed to supply all the blood groups to major hospitals during the holidays.
“A blood group O donor can donate his/her blood to any other blood donor with a different blood group. However, when an O donor needs blood, they can only get it from an O blood donor,” Massundah said.
She said hospitals mainly ordered blood group O to meet their needs as most of the hospitals that were outside of major towns do not perform cross-matching.
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She said the trends were also the same regionally and globally where demand for blood group O was high and that they were never able to meet a 100% supply of this blood group. Massundah said they had been prioritising critical cases for blood group O.
“We have resumed the schools programme which should normalise the situation. The NBSZ/Joina City Mall festive season campaign, which kicked off on November 26, is coming to an end this month and this will assist in boosting the O stocks,” she said.
Massundah said last December, 4 348 people donated blood at their various static and mobile clinics around the country while a blood drive in Karoi was cancelled due to a malaria outbreak. Three other drives were cancelled at Hippo Valley, Chivaraidze and Triangle due to a labour strike.
