July 7, 1999

Blood and altruism

As best I can figure, I've given about 63 or 64 pints of blood in the past 49 years. That's an average of a little more than one and a quarter units a year, nowhere near what the champion donors do. There are people who've averaged three or four or even five units a year for as long as I've been giving blood.

I recently heard we're heading into a continuing blood shortage. Donations are eroding. Demand is increasing. There's not much to do about the increasing demand except set stricter priorities and use blood only when really necessary.

To stop or even reverse the downhill slide in donations, we have to make it even easier to donate, and we have to make donors feel even better about themselves. I know how important it is to have a safe blood supply, especially with the AIDS epidemic. That epidemic scares the dickens out of blood bank operators, as well it should. They can't afford to have one HIV positive donor slip through.

That means they feel they must ask donors like me questions about my sex life ("have you had sex with a man EVEN ONCE since 1977?) that even my wife has never thought necessary to ask. Then, after asking a raft of questions of the most embarrassing and personal nature, they feel they must give me another chance to back out of the deal. They used to allow donors privacy to mark a card "don't use", and slip it into a lock box. Now they suggest that if you have "the flu" or just aren't feeling well in the following three days, call them and they won't use the blood. That's a diplomatic out intended to solve a serious problem. For some reason the blood bankers also feel they must know my race. That's an intrusion. I refuse to tell them.

Another way to cut down on dangerous blood is to use only altruistic donors, people like me who get only the satisfaction of feeling good that we've taken an hour or two to help someone who will never know us. By not paying us, they eliminate an incentive to lie.

There are some parts of the donation process that are annoying but unavoidable, like the pricks in the finger and the arm. However, the questionnaire could be modified to something like "have you done anything since the last time you donated that might cause us concern?" After all, if I've told them the last ten times I've donated that I haven't had sex with a man since 1977, it's unlikely I'll report differently this time. Yet the question is repeated at every donation, ad nauseum.

To stop hillside erosion on land, we spread a little grass seed here, plant a tree there. We put in check dams on gullies and plant windbreaks in windy places. Each step is small, but the cumulative effect is large.

Only five percent of the population gives most of the blood supply. To keep them coming back, and increase their number, small annoyances must be minimized or eliminated, and donor satisfaction increased. If you've reduced or stopped your visits to the blood bank, or if you've never donated, you owe it to them to let them know why. There is a Soil Conservation Service for farmland. Perhaps we need a Blood Donors Conservation Service to protect and encourage this irreplaceable resource.

And you thought all Paul Azevedo gave was his opinion. To give him your opinion, e-mail him at Paul@thereactor.net. To give your blood, call the blood bank at 697-4034.