SA National Blood Service reveals less than 1% of citizens donate blood
That's below a World Health Organization (WHO) target, which requires countries to have a 1% to 3% donor rate.
With June being National Blood Donor Month, there are increased calls for more citizens to donate blood.
However, the spokesperson for th e SANBS, Thandi Mosupye, says socio-economic issues and disease pose a challenge.
'Our previous census from 2022, you will see that S outh Africa has got about 62 million people, but if you look at the number in terms of donors that are there, you'll see that we are just short of 1%.'
Mosupye says blood is needed for patients during surgery and paediatric care.
'We need to collect about 3,500 units of blood on a daily basis to meet the demand of the areas in which we are servicing, and in the past, we've found ourselves having come short of that number though at this point in time we are doing fairly well in terms of our collection.'
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Next Stay Close ✕ Supply Chain Vulnerabilities Are Killing Us The weaknesses in our supply chain environment are equally alarming. There are massive leakages between legal and illicit distribution channels. In the Sahel region, 40 percent of detected substandard and falsified medical products were found inside regulated supply chains. This means our own systems are being compromised. Border control remains woefully inadequate. Customs officials at major ports inspect fewer than 10 percent of containers, relying primarily on risk-based X-ray screening. Meanwhile, 37 percent of vaccines in low and middle-income country supply chains show freezing exposure during storage, potentially destroying their effectiveness. The AUDA-NEPAD Working Group on Substandard and Falsified Medical Products took place in Addis Ababa. 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