The Need is Great. . .

• Blood cannot be manufactured. Its only source is a healthy volunteer donor.
• The American Red Cross provides about half the nation's blood supply - roughly six million pints per year.
• Nationally, less than 5% of the population gives blood, supporting the other 95%.
• 1400 pints of blood must be collected every working day in Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont to meet patient needs.
• The New England Red Cross Region serves 170 hospitals.
• In general, fewer people donate during summer months and holidays, but blood usage often increases. Summer and holiday donors are especially valuable.
• Blood is perishable. Red blood cells must be used within 42 days. Other blood products must be used within 5 days.
• Over the past three years, one million fewer people have donated blood.

• Blood is available to any patient who needs it. Patients are not required to find donors to replace the blood they used. It is a community responsibility.
• One pint of blood is separated into its component parts - red cells, plasma and platelets - and given to several different patients.
• Blood transports nutrients and oxygen, fights infection, provides clotting factors and eliminates wastes.
• Blood products are used for surgery, trauma, chemotherapy, kidney dialysis, hemophilia, shock and other life-threatening conditions.

• Giving blood is simple, safe and takes about an hour. The actual donation takes 6 to 10 minutes.
• You absolutely, positively cannot get AIDS or any other disease from giving blood. A sterile needle is used only once and then discarded.
• Most people who are in good health, 17 years of age or older and weighing over 110 pounds can give blood through the Red Cross.
• The average adult body contains about 10 to 12 pints of blood.
• Your body quickly replaces the fluid from the blood you give.
• Getting a good night's sleep, having a good breakfast or lunch and drinking plenty of fluids helps prepare a donor for giving blood.
• Blood donors can give blood every eight weeks, or six times a year.
• Each blood donor receives a mini-physical before donating, including temperature, pulse, medical history and hemoglobin (or iron) level.
• The Red Cross only collects blood from voluntary donors.

• Every unit of blood donated is carefully screened in the laboratory to detect the presence of disease and to determine blood type.
• People are one of four blood types (A, B, AB and O) and are either Rh positive or Rh negative. Blood types are inherited.
• Type O negative is called the Universal Donor because, in an emergency, it can be given to people with other blood types.
• Type O positive is the most common blood type. During periods of shortage, it is the first to "feel the pinch" since most patients will have Type O positive blood.