Students – Vietnam’s largest blood suppliers – join a voluntary blood donation day in Hanoi last November.

Hundreds of children need blood donations before they can spend the Tet holiday with their families.

The native of the northern Phu Tho Province has been visiting the hospital as long as he can remember.

His mother takes him to the hospital every few months for Hemophilia B treatment.

If the hospital has enough blood in storage for transfusion, Tri’s treatment period lasts ten days but the hospital always lacks blood and he’s often there much longer.

Dang Thi Cun, 14, from the northern province of Yen Bai, has Thalassemia, a blood deficiency. The girl may have to undergo blood transfusions for the rest of her life.

Over the past two weeks, Cun has been transfused with five 250ml-450ml bags of blood, but she often has to wait four days for each bag as there’s simply not enough in storage.

She grows weaker each day she does not have new blood but the doctors must use what little blood they do have for emergency situations.

In the days leading up to Tet, Cun and other patients are waiting for blood in hopes they can enjoy a healthy holiday with their families.

Blood department Head Duong Ba Truc says the demand for blood transfusions rises every Tet as families want their children to be healthy for the holidays.

But he says demand has outweighed supply for the past several years.

Over the past two weeks, the hospital’s Hematology and Blood Transfusion Department has had access to less than half of the 500 units of blood (a unit equals 250 milliliters) it has needed to meet demand, doctors say.

Pham Tuan Duong, deputy head of the National Institute of Hematology and Blood Transfusion (NIHBT), says another problem is that key blood donators, usually students, are too busy with semester examinations and Tet preparations.

Student blood donations account for 60 percent of all blood collected by NIHBT, institute Director Nguyen Anh Tri says, adding that the number of regular blood donors has been halved in the last year.

NIHBT has recently launched a campaign asking for blood donations from major companies, but many have failed to participate, saying they are too busy with year-end work, Duong says.

Urgency

Tri says the institute simply can’t meet the daily demand for blood.

Supplying blood for more than 60 hospitals in some 16 northern provinces, the institute has to distribute some 500 to 700 units of blood and blood products per day.

The institute says it needs some 10,000 blood units to meet its Tet demand but Tri says they expect to collect only 4,500 units.

Truc’s department is now treating some 1,000 patients with blood diseases, all of whom need life-long blood transfusions.

On some days, more than 40 children come to the hospital for outpatient transfusions but many of them have to leave with nothing because of the blood shortage, he says.

Some have to wait for as many as three to four days for transfusions, according to the doctor.

“We watch the children get weaker and weaker each day because no blood is available. We’re very worried,” he says.

“So, please donate blood to help them stay healthy during Tet and enjoy it with their families,” Truc says.

Source: Tien Phong