Brazzaville, 10 June 2005 -- WHO Regional Director for Africa, Dr Luis Sambo, has appealed to health authorities in the region to promote and intensify the collection of blood from voluntary unpaid blood donors through well-organized donor recruitment systems, as this has been shown to be safer, more effective and more efficient than hospital-based family or replacement donations.

“A well-organized and coordinated national blood transfusion service based on voluntary unpaid blood donations and supported by effective quality management programmes can efficiently prevent the transmission of HIV/AIDS and other blood-borne diseases and save lives of millions of people, particularly vulnerable groups such as mothers”, Dr Sambo said in a message to commemorate World Blood Donor Day, which will be observed in WHO’s 192 Member States on 14 June.

The theme of the Day this year is “Celebrating your gift of blood”.

Transfusion of blood and blood products saves millions of lives each year. However, in most developing countries, preventable deaths still occur due to inadequate supply of safe blood and blood products. Most of this burden falls on women and children as a consequence of pregnancy-related complications, malnutrition, malaria and other infectious diseases. Trauma, including road traffic accidents, and injuries due to armed conflicts also increase the demand for blood.

Data compiled by WHO indicate that Africa lags behind in the collection of safe blood from voluntary unpaid donors to save the lives of millions people in the region in need of the transfusion of blood and blood products.

In 2001, the WHO Global Database on Blood Safety showed that only 33% of the blood collected was from low- and medium-income countries where 82% of the world’s population lives. Also, 95% of blood donations in high-income countries are voluntary and unpaid, compared to only 25% in low-income countries.

According to Dr Sambo, “the same picture is reflected in blood safety data in the African Region where most of the countries still collect more than 50% of donations from family or replacement donors. Only 10 out of the 46 countries collect all blood from voluntary unpaid donors”.

In countries with well-organized blood donor systems, such as Cote d’Ivoire, South Africa and Zimbabwe, the HIV prevalence among blood donors has been shown to be very low, less than 1%, compared to that of the general population which ranges from 5% to 35%. “It is my hope that more countries in our Region will aspire to achieve such results”, Dr Sambo said.

The WHO African Region adopted a Blood Safety Strategy in 2001. One of its objectives is to assist countries to set up effective systems of recruitment of low-risk blood donors. A key target of the strategy is to have at least 80% of blood donations in Member States be voluntary and unpaid by the end of 2012.

Dr Sambo stated that in the last five years, countries in the region had made commendable efforts and recorded steady progress in improving the safety of blood.

He noted that since the adoption of the Regional Blood Safety Strategy in 2001, many countries, with the support of the Regional Office, had embarked on activities such as the development of national policies and plans, training of quality managers, implementation of quality management programmes, and development of material to sensitize the general population about voluntary blood donation. To date, 40 of the 46 countries in the region have developed national blood policies, though the implementation rate has been slow.

The Regional Director concluded: “I call upon all national health authorities to take advantage of this day to strengthen donor recruitment activities by encouraging community participation and ownership of the blood donor component of blood transfusion services”.

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