Editorial (Daily Searchlight of Thursday, 28th July,, 2022.)
The Deputy Minister of Information, Hajia Fati Abubakar has urged Ghanaians to generously donate blood to save the lives of people in the country.
Addressing the Media at a Blood Donation exercise at the Ministry of Information in Accra, she stressed the importance of blood donation in people’s lives during critical moments.
“If you are in position to donate please do it to help our brothers and sisters who are in need of it because. By so doing we may save dear lives. Besides, you may not know when your relatives may be in need of blood in future,” the Deputy Minister stated.
The Deputy Minister made this statement when she stepped in to speak on behalf of the minister of Information who was taken out for another assignment elsewhere. This exercise is the second of its kind. It had a target of 100 pints of blood because the first donation in 21st July, 2021 that roped in 78 pints of blood.
Donors were journalists and staff of the Ministry. There was health screening exercise as well. The project took off at 10.40 am as and donors and sponsors thronged there for the exercise.
The exercise was supported by Stanbic, Exim Bank, Coca Cola, Graphic Communications and others. The Principal Blood Donation Officer, Madam Joyce Adu pleaded with the public to willingly donate blood to fill the bank to meet emergency requirements.
She said blood collected is properly screened and safely kept to avoid contamination. She thanked the ministry for the gesture. She also thanked the donors and sponsors for their support.
In reaction, the Daily Searchlight believes that private initiative should be allowed to participate in ensuring the supply of blood to hospitals.
The fact of the matter is that there are millions of Ghanaians who would willingly give blood, if they knew that they would be paid for the effort. There is also hundreds of thousands who would buy blood, under the right circumstances.
It seems to us rather odd, that in such a situation, you would have people in dire need of blood for medical reasons, having to do without.
We believe that the solution, is for the government to allow the private sector to play a role in this exercise. People can give their blood for money, and people who need them can buy. All that has to be done, is to ensure strong regulation to offset abuse.
It should be a pre-condition that the supply of even on unsafe vial of blood, would be the pre-condition for the withdrawal of licenses.
We believe that if and when government accepts such a suggestion, we would be on the way to the way to solving the issue of shortage of blood in the nation’s hospitals.
(This article was first published in the column EDITORIAL of the Daily Searchlight of Thursday, 28th July,, 2022. The Daily Searchlight appears on the newsstands of Ghana every working day and PDF versions are available for sale online twenty-four hours a day all day throughout the world on www.ghananewsstand.com).
