Hospitals running out of blood – Director

Dr. Justina Ansah, Director of the National Blood Transfusion Service (NBTS), Korle-Bu, has warned that the service is running out of blood and that the system of feeding it would have to change to keep it going.

She was addressing the press on the activities of the blood bank in Accra. Dr. Ansah noted that although the capacity required by the bank should be between 80,000 to 100,000 units, it has only 60,000 units. "At the moment, the headquarters at Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital has only 93 units of blood," she said, adding that more blood is going out than is coming in. Dr. Ansah said the NBTS intends to change the present system under which blood is given to patients from the replacement system to a voluntary one to ensure the provision of safe blood to patients requiring the therapy.

She explained that whereas with the voluntary system donors come confidently and donate freely, under the replacement system, relatives of patients have to pay money to people they do not know to donate. "We have difficulty with the replacement (system) in areas of screening and knowing the history of the donor, which compromises the safety of the blood." Dr. Ansah said the NBTS proposes to have the new system operating in Accra by 2001 and to cover the whole country by 2005.

She said the voluntary system has supplied only 27 per cent of the requirements, adding that the public needs to be educated and encouraged to donate more to meet the high demand "since it is the civic responsibility of everybody". She said the blood bank does not only transfuse blood but also produces red blood cells, platelets and plasma, among other things, which are stored and used for emergencies such as burns, acute anaemia and severe bleeding during labour.

Dr. Ansah explained that blood that is donated is transfused only after a series of tests to assertion its safety.