The Director General of the National Blood Service Agency, Prof Saleh Yuguda said Nigeria is in short of blood supply, and supplies less than 30 per cent of its needs. So that is very unique. We also know that blood is not available, as I said earlier, and we have a shortage of supply.
Yuguda said this on Sunday in celebration of the third National Blood Donor Day in Abuja.
The day was aimed at promoting voluntary blood donation and recognises the selfless contributions of indigenous blood donors, and a parley with religious leaders in mobilising community support for blood donation and promoting a culture of voluntary giving.
“As you are all aware, blood is a very scarce commodity, which is very scarce in our society. In fact, the World Health Organisation estimated that here in Nigeria, we are in short of blood supply. We are able to supply less than 30 per cent of our needs. So that is very unique. We also know that blood is not available, as I said earlier, and we have a shortage of supply. And this is largely due to the fact that you and I that are healthy are not willing to come out and donate. So we want to use this opportunity to call on all Nigerians to come out and donate blood freely. You stand a chance to benefit from this because you are actually saving humanity.
“And the advantages are numerous. Because for every one pint of blood that you donate, you stand a chance of saving at least three lives. And you’re also giving a life to somebody that you don’t know. So, that’s why we are calling on all Nigerians to come out and donate blood freely. Like I said earlier, blood is very scarce in our community. WHO estimated that the shortage of blood in Nigeria is more than 70 per cent.
“We are able to supply less than 30% of our needs. By estimate, we are supposed to have at least, for us to achieve our self-sufficiency of blood in the country, we need communities to be donating blood freely. But here in Nigeria, we are far below that target by the WHO. And we also know the shortage of blood impacts negatively on all the health indices in the country, be it maternal mortality, infant mortality, under-five mortality, and even death from road traffic accidents, and so on.”
The don said the majority of those that die from road traffic accidents die because of shortage of blood.
“So, we are therefore calling on all willing Nigerians to come out and donate blood freely. We want to use this opportunity to appreciate the Family Worship Centre for giving us this opportunity to come out. We have been moving from one community to another, and we felt that the community engagement is paramount in achieving our target of our self-sufficiency in blood supply in the country.
“That’s why we are here calling on the religious bodies to come and support us, and also call on their congregations to come out freely to be donating blood,” he stated.
A Pastor at the Family Worship Centre, Wilson Akubo urged religious leaders across Nigeria to rally their congregations in support of blood donation.
Speaking on behalf of the Senior Pastor of the church, Serah Omakwu, Akubo highlighted the critical role that faith communities can play in saving lives.
“For the past 20 years, we have been actively involved in saving lives through blood donation. I implore all churches, pastors, and imams to inspire their members to donate blood willingly. It is a life-saving act, and when we do this, we do it as a service to God,” he said.
