Blood donation is the process of donating blood to be used for medical purposes, such as a blood transplant. All year-round, blood donations are needed.
After donating blood, it is sent off to be tested for any disease before being sorted and registered. Firstly, white blood cells are filtered out. Blood is put in a centrifuge to be organised into different components: red blood cells, plasma and platelets. Since the blood is separated into three parts, one donation can be used to help up to three people.
The reason why there is such a demand for blood from the black community is it is more beneficial to receive blood from a similar ethnicity. In the black community, the demand for blood is simply not being met.
Only 3% of blood donations are from the black or Asian community. Blood donation is vital for people suffering from sickle cell anaemia. In sickle cell anaemia, blood is chronically low in oxygen and it mainly impacts people within the black community. In the 2019/2020 records of donation, there were 15,660 new donors from BAME (4,982 black people and 8,791 from Asian-Indian/ Pakistani/ Arab/ other mixed communities). For blood donation to reach an appropriate level, there needs to be a continuing cycle of donation at around 40,000 to meet demand.
A person can donate blood every four months and at any time of the year.