World Blood Donor Day: Ghana’s blood bank empty

The National Blood Service Ghana laboratory which is supposed to be swarmed with blood from donors and prepared for transfusion to recipients has been left with almost nothing.

At the time the news team toured the blood bank of the Service, just about 10 pints blood which comprises of all the blood groups were left in the laboratory.

With the rare blood group category, only one pint of A negative and two of B negative were spotted in the safe.

In an interaction with the Head of component Lab at the National Blood Service Ghana, Evelyn Amponsah-Fordjour bemoaned the unavailability of the product in the blood bank. This, she said poses a threat to anemic people and pregnant women who need blood for survival in the hospital.

She, therefore, called on voluntary donors to come to their aid to restock their blood supply in the lab.

Evelyn Amponsah-Fordjour noted that “we are not in normal times. There can be an emergency, especially pregnant women, anaemic and terminally ill patients. Cancer patients also need some blood or blood products. So we are using this medium to appeal to everyone to come and donate.”

She further squashed preconceived ideas that blood donated to the center were sold to others for money.

She stated categorically that blood donated to the center were not used for fetish purposes as some people claimed.