Blood is a special medicine that is not currently replaceable. Every year in the world, around 130 million blood units are needed for treatment, emergency and disaster preparedness. However, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), in recent years, worldwide 81 million units of blood have been collected each year (according to reports from 178 countries). Based on the Human Development Indicators (HDI) reports, 54 countries of high HDI (16% of the world population) have contributed 61% of the world’s blood, while 124 Countries with medium and low HDI (accounting for 82% of the world population) have contributed only 39% of the world’s blood. This is a serious imbalance in ensuring blood supply to patients between countries and regions. While it is worth noting that in developed countries with high HDI, only 94% of blood was obtained from voluntary blood donors, only 34 countries in the world had the rate at 100%.
Blood donation to save lives – a noble gesture
The two major concerns on the world’s health in blood transfusion are the lack of regular blood donors and the safety of transfused blood (due to increasing HIV / AIDS prevalence, and high hepatitis virus infection… ). Therefore, to solve these two difficulties, in all countries in the world, the issue of blood donation is always respected and focused on. The overall goal is that all blood must come from voluntary blood donors, who volunteer to donate blood or blood components without any request for money or any form of gift, no benefit-seeking blood donation, no pressure involved. And there must be willingness to collaborate with blood transfusion centers to ensure the blood safety for the recipients. Only voluntary blood donors are safe blood donors; Only safe blood donors can give safe and quality blood units for the treatment of the patients.
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However, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), only 34 countries have achieved the rate of 100% of blood units obtained from voluntary blood donors. In most other countries, the supply do not fully meet the demand for blood for treatment, and the blood supply is still expected from benefit-seeking blood donors and family member blood donors, or substitutive blood donors ( someone to donate blood replacing family members).
In 1975, the World Health General Assembly passed a resolution – WHA 28.72, which called on all member countries to focus on developing national blood services with the foundation based on voluntary blood donors, who seek no benefit from blood donating. To confirm its determination to create safe blood supply globally, the World Health Organization, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies have collaborated for many years for blood safety and blood donor programs. These highlights are the commitments on the ethical principles related to blood safety. Coordinating to organise World Health Day for Blood Safety (April 7, 2000), many regional & international conferences have been held regularly …
To acknowledge, thank and encourage the donors to continue donating blood, in 2004, the World Health Organization, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the International Blood Transfusion Association and the World Blood Donor Association concurred to take June 14th as World Blood Donor Day. June 14th is the birthday of Professor Karl Lendsteiner – the Austrian, chosen to commemorate the inventor of the blood group ABO in 1900 (who won the Nobel Prize for medicine), which brought the world history of blood transfusion a significant step forward.
The purpose of World Blood Donor Day is not to mobilize more blood donors to donate blood on this day but to call on nations and communities to recognize and organize events to honor the noble gesture of the blood donors. They are ordinary people, but for the sick, they are heroes. They have donated to the sick, and to the life two priceless gifts which are BLOOD and TIME (the time to go to donate blood). Thanks to these gifts, thanks to these noble gestures, everyyear in the world there are hundreds of millions of people’s lives have been saved.
Following the success of the World Blood Donor Day in 2004, the mentioned above organizations agreed to take June 14th as the World Blood Donor Day. A website dedicated to this day has been established connecting the countries, regions and continents around the world for related activities.
(www.wbdd.org). Governments around the world have also paid close attention to this activity in their own country.
Van Minh