The number of blood donations is the lowest its been in 20 years. The lack of donors means the American Red Cross is facing an emergency blood shortage which could lead to elective surgery cancellations.
Mara Thompson, regional communications manager for the American Red Cross of Illinois, said the shortage means the agency is sending more blood to hospitals then it is collecting from donors.
WCBU's Camryn Cutinello spoke with Thompson about why the shortage is happening and what it means for hospitals.
This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity and brevity.
Why is this shortage happening?
Mara Thompson: Winter is always a challenging time for us, specifically around the holidays. People are busy, their schedules are changing. It's not top of mind for people. Regular blood donors may be traveling, things like that. So we always kind of see a dip this time of year. But I think some of the added challenges we're dealing with as well is, there's an uptick in COVID case, as people are getting sick again, they're not feeling well. And of course, we don't want people that aren't feeling well to come out and give blood. So all of those things combined led to about a 7,000 unit decrease between the week of Christmas and New Year's. So even just trying to come back from that is challenging on top of it already being a difficult time of year.
And what were, you mentioned people getting sick, but what were some of the kind of larger impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic?
I think, in general, that has been one of our challenges over the past several years. Even in the past 20 years, we've seen about 40% less people regularly showing up to get blood and we contribute a lot of that to the pandemic. Before the pandemic, we a lot of times would have people at work hosting events, but people aren't going into the office as much anymore. And people aren't, their work/life situation is just different. A lot of people are working from home. They're not getting out and about to maybe make stopping at a blood drive one of their regular stops.
What are the impacts that we'll see from a blood shortage?
So, of course, we want to make sure that everyone has the blood that they need. So elective surgeries are usually kind of the first thing to go. We'll start cutting those things off. But we don't have to make those decisions quite yet. Hopefully, we don't have to. And that's why we call a shortage to let people know hopefully they can open up time in their schedules to come donate before it gets to that point. But that's why we make this call, is so that hospitals aren't in the position to have to start picking and choosing patients over another, because we never want that to be a situation, obviously.
Does the Red Cross have any other potential reasons for why people are just donating blood less?
When it comes down to it, about 62% of the population is eligible to donate, but only 3% of that actually does go out and donate. We see the same blood donors over and over again. Our regular blood donors are very consistent, and we are so grateful that they come out and donate. But where we are struggling is those first time donors.
People, unless they're used to having it in their schedule, it's not something that they're thinking to do. But it really is so easy. And I'm an example of that. Really, before I started working with the Red Cross, I'll be honest, I had never given blood because it just wasn't top of mind. Unless you are at a university or school or workplace where maybe they have a blood drive there, it wouldn't necessarily be something that you think to add into your regular schedule. But at the end of the day, it does save lives giving blood and the whole process only takes about an hour start to finish, you're on the bed for really only 10 to 15 minutes.
What impact has the FDA recently dropping restrictions related to gay and bisexual men had?
I don't know if they can really talk about the impact. I don't think we've gotten any like numbers about 'okay, yes, we've seen an increase.' But what I can tell you about that is the Red Cross has always wanted to have the most inclusive blood donation process that it can and this is just an added step towards that we of course want anyone that is healthy and able to donate to give blood the opportunity to do so.
What is the current criteria? How can someone find out if they're eligible to give blood?
Anyone 17 or older is eligible to give blood, 16 with parental consent. But really what we do is, if you've never given blood before, as long as you're a normal, healthy person, you don't think you have any preexisting conditions, things like that, you're probably eligible. And what we'll do is before you come in to donate blood, we'll send you a health questionnaire screening. And you just go through some of those questions. And then that would flag if there's anything in there that would allow you not to donate to give blood.
So if you knew that ahead of time, and it disqualifies you, then you'll know ahead of time. But most people, like I said, 62% of the population is eligible to donate to give blood, you fill out that health screening questionnaire, you talk to a phlebotomist, when they get there, you go through some of your hemoglobin levels and some of that stuff just to make sure on the day of, you are good and your levels are good, and you'll be healthy and not have any issues. But yeah, as long as you're 17 and 110 pounds, those are pretty much the qualification, the base qualifications that you need.
How can interested people find a place to donate?
The easiest way to do that is to go to RedCrossBlood.org. We also have the blood donor app, which is really great. And all you do is you put in your ZIP code and it pops up all of the closest blood drives in your area for the next two weeks or whatever you can put out whatever timing you want in for that. And then you just go ahead and sign up. You don't need to know your blood type. You don't really need to know anything. You can just show up and they'll walk you through all the steps that you need before your donation.
