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Red Cross warns of blood shortage as July Fourth weekend approaches
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Related Topics: BALTIMORE
BALTIMORE (Map, News) - Alanna Ward’s heart stopped beating four minutes before she arrived at the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore City.
The off-duty Montgomery County police officer had been in a serious car crash this past May and suffered from a severed bronchial tube, among other injuries.
More than 150 pints of blood later, Ward survived.
“There’s over 150 strangers that saved her life. Every pint counts,” said her husband, Mike Ward.
Now, Mike Ward is on a crusade to encourage people to donate blood, especially as the demand rises in the summer.
“It’s one of the easiest ways the average person can save someone’s life,” Ward said at a news conference Wednesday at Shock Trauma.
As people take vacations and are distracted during the summer months, fewer donate blood, said Gary Ouellette, CEO of the American Red Cross Greater Chesapeake and Potomac region.
The need is often greater in the summer, as more people spend time driving and putting themselves at risk for accidents, said Dr. Thomas Scalea, Shock Trauma’s physician in chief.
“We tend to pop” over holiday weekends, he said.
But as the Fourth of July weekend nears, the Red Cross is running low on blood, officials said.
The backup supply of Type O blood at the region’s Red Cross is down to a half-day supply.
A three- to four-day supply at the Red Cross is ideal, and hospitals usually have their own three-day supply, Ouellette said.
“It’s not an emergency situation, but it could get there,” he said, adding that this past year, the Red Cross “cut it really close” to running out of blood.
Testing and processing donated blood takes about three days, so blood donated this week would be available for the July Fourth weekend, Ouellette said.
Blood lasts about a month and a half, after it’s donated.
After 9/11, eager donors flooded the blood banks, and much of the blood had to be discarded, making it hard for Red Cross officials to hammer home the message.
“People respond to an emotional event, [but] those events happen every day,” Ouellette said.
smichael@baltimoreexaminer.com
Comments from Examiner Readers
4:44 AM MST on Thu., Jun. 26, 2008 re: "Red Cross warns of blood shortage as July Fourth weekend approaches"
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Examiner Reader said:
HIV, AIDS You should not give blood if you have AIDS or have ever had a positive HIV test, or if you have done something that puts you at risk for becoming infected with HIV. You are at risk for getting infected if you: are a male who has had sexual contact with another male, even once, since 1977 have ever taken money, drugs or other payment for sex since 1977 have had sexual contact in the past 12 months with anyone described above When will testing overcome stigma. Sex with a male since 1977 but if a person has other sexually transmitted diseases, (Acceptable if it has been more than 12 months since you completed treatment for syphilis or gonorrhea. Chlamydia, venereal warts (human papilloma virus), or genital herpes are not a cause for deferral if you are feeling healthy and well and meet all other eligibility requirements. ) then after 12 months that blood is safe? There is more safe blood out there once the Blood System gets smart.
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