Students, especially students from the best schools, are the largest blood donor organization in the East African country, however, schools have been closed since March as a component of efforts to curb the spread of the virus.
This is that the government blood collection company is not meeting its goals.
Dr. Emmanuel Batiibwe, director of a hospital that serves many of the capital’s poorest citizens, Kampala, has cited deaths in recent months related to blood shortages.
One of the victims was a woman with pregnancy complications. Children under the age of five and patients undergoing surgery are also among those who want a blood transfusion, he said.
In July, the China-Uganda Friendship Hospital in Batiibwe won 18 of the 218 blood sets requested. The following month 68 of the 217 sets arrived, he said.
“There’s a place,” he said, calling scarcity a “disaster. “
The head of Uganda’s blood transfusion services, dr. Dorothy Byabazaire told lawmakers this year that her firm had collected 56,850 sets of 75,000 goals between April and July.
Facilities across the country send blood orders to the agency and there is a mechanism to share them in an emergency. But “borrowing” blood can take time, Batiibwe said.
The Uganda Red Cross, which is helping the government mobilize blood donors, said it was not easy to recruit donors for the pandemic, as the country has shown more than 8,600 cases of coronavirus, adding up to 79 deaths.
“People don’t eat well anymore. People are stressed,” spokeswoman Irene Nakasiita said, adding that some potential and willing donors are rejected because their blood levels are too low.
Ariho Franco, a donor recruiter for a blood bank operation at the personal mengo hospital in Kampala, addressed similar demand situations through Ariho Franco, who said that if schools are closed, they are placed in public places. in the center of Kampala. Donors get soft drinks and biscuits.
“Blood shortages are a serious challenge because the few people we can succeed with can’t donate for reasons,” Franco said.
He said blood draw groups face demanding situations in locating donors between communities that are reeling from the economic effects of the pandemic. Some other people say they don’t know where their next meal will come from, he said.
“At the end of the day, some other people can only do it for God’s mercy because the little blood that has been collected will only be reserved for serious emergencies,” he said.
Blood shortages have been reported elsewhere, adding up to parts of Europe.
Romania’s local media cited concerns about COVID-19 infections as one of the reasons for the decline in the number of blood donors. The cities of Iasi and Cluj face a desperate situation, as some cancer patients who need common transfusions and others who require urgent surgery have had to bring their own donors to survive.
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Vadim Ghirda contributed in Bucharest, Romania.
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