Awareness campaign celebrates the gift of blood

The GHA’s Blood Donation Department yesterday celebrated World Blood Donor Day at Casemates Square, with members of the public volunteering to register as potential donors.

Queues of people could be seen patiently waiting to sign up. The successful event saw people have their blood tested to assess their potential to donate.

There are currently 2,000 Gibraltarians registered as donors and the awareness event aimed to raise this number by highlighting the importance of donations.

“This is a celebration of the gift of giving blood from donors who do it without any reward,” said Blood Bank Manager Ernest Gomez.

“We are saying thank you to all blood donors and at the time trying to spread the word to other people that we are open and available for people come in and donate whenever they want.”

Those who attended yesterday’s awareness event and had their blood tested will be called at a later date for the opportunity to donate.

Some 700 units are collected annually in Gibraltar with the blood used for operations and treatments.

“There are strict guidelines that mark how often a person can donate depending on the difference of haemoglobin in the blood,” Mr Gomez said.

He added that men can donate a maximum of four times a year and women three times a year.

Pic by Johnny Bugeja