Coronavirus fear saps blood supply in Kentucky and nation. Donations badly needed.
Count Kentucky’s blood supply among the victims of the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Blood donations have dropped significantly in recent days as people avoid public spaces to try to avoid exposure to COVID-19 and colleges, schools and businesses curtail operations, according to officials with the Kentucky Blood Center.
Donation drives at colleges and schools typically are an important source of blood this time of year, but many have been canceled, said Martha Osborne, vice president of marketing for the blood center.
Osborne said 45 percent of the blood drives initially scheduled this month have been canceled, and walk-in visits to donation centers are down.
Blood center staffers were scheduled to be at the University of Kentucky beginning March 28 for a weeklong drive, but with UK switching to online classes for the rest of the semester, the center will miss out on 300 to 400 pints of blood it anticipated receiving.
The center has less than a two-day supply of blood ready to ship to the 70 hospitals it serves across Kentucky, though hospitals also have some on hand, Osborne said.
The center’s inventory of O-positive and O-negative blood is even tighter — barely one day’s worth, Osborne said.
That’s a concern because O-negative can be given to people with other blood types, and O-positive is the most common type, so the two are the most-used in treatments.
The blood center prefers to stock a three to five-day supply of blood.
“We’re getting very, very challenged,” Osborne said.
The situation is compounded because more blood is used in Kentucky in surgeries and medical treatments, including cancer treatment, than in-state donors provide.
That means the state typically imports blood, but that help isn’t available these days because Kentucky isn’t the only place dealing with a drop in donations.
Nationally, about 4,000 blood drives have been canceled, taking 130,000 pints of blood out of the supply that would normally have been available, said Kate Fry, chief executive officer of America’s Blood Centers.
Members of that network, including the Kentucky Blood Center, collect about 60 percent of the blood supply in the U.S.
The American Red Cross collects most of the rest of the total. That figure on 4,000 canceled donation drives includes both Red Cross and America’s Blood Centers, Fry said.
“This is truly an unprecedented scenario for the U.S. blood supply,” Fry said.
The situation could get worse if donations continue to lag.
“Going forward, we’re going to be struggling,” Osborne said. “Traumas will continue. It is imperative that healthy individuals continue to donate blood as soon as they can and as often as they can.”
People don’t increase their risk of contracting the coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, by giving blood, Fry said.
Kentucky Blood Center staffers are taking extra precautions to clean surfaces and are keeping donors a safe distance from each other.
“We’re taking steps to make sure when you are here, you are safe,” said Jolyn Honeycutt, manager of the Kentucky Blood Center donor center in Somerset.
Donors can schedule a visit to a blood center at a time when there aren’t a lot of other people there if they’re concerned, and can complete the health questionnaire online to cut the time spent at a center and help staffers plan.
The blood center also is encouraging businesses, churches and others to schedule drives.
There is a donation drive scheduled Wednesday at Dick’s Sporting Goods in Frankfort from 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., and others scheduled next week in Lexington and Morehead.
The schedule and information on setting up a donation drive or visiting the non-profit’s donor centers in Lexington, Louisville, Somerset and Pikeville are available on the Kentucky Blood Center site.
At a drive Monday at Senture, a call center in Wayne County, Lynn Bell said she is concerned about the novel coronavirus.
However, Bell said she wasn’t concerned about giving blood because donor-center staffers take precautions to keep donors and the blood supply safe.
Bell noted doctors used donated bone and tissue to treat her after a leg injury.
“I do it because you never know whose family member, your family member, your friend, your co-worker may need this blood, and if it’s not there where do they get it from? Bell said. “People have to think outside of themselves to be willing to help someone else in need.”
