As the coronavirus outbreak spreads across the US, a dangerous blood shortage threatens to create another public health crisis – with one medical director warning: “This could kill our patients.”

Coronavirus control methods mandate social distancing that has ranged from banning in-person seating in restaurants to closing schools to issuing shelter-in-place orders. Many places where blood donation might take place – such as campuses and libraries – are presently shuttered.

The result has been a disaster for blood donation as the medical sector finds its blood supplies running out.

The American Red Cross said that as of 19 March, more than 5,000 of its blood drives were canceled across the US over coronavirus concerns – resulting in approximately 170,000 fewer donations. More than 80% of donated blood collected from the Red Cross is from drives at places closed for social distancing: workplaces, schools, and college campuses.

“Right now, American Red Cross faces a severe blood shortage due to an unprecedented number of blood drive cancellations during this coronavirus outbreak,” the organization said, urging healthy persons to donate blood, platelets and plasma. “This blood shortage could impact patients who need surgery, victims of car accidents and other emergencies, or patients fighting cancer.”

“This could lead to mortality,” said Dr Jennifer Andrews, director of the blood bank at Vanderbilt University medical center and pediatric hematologist. “This could kill our patients.”

Vanderbilt’s medical complex, like many other US hospitals, mainly receives its blood supply from American Red Cross.

“This is really serious – it’s put many large hospitals, like Vanderbilt, in a crunch, where we’re not expecting our usual deliveries from the American Red Cross,” Andrews told the Guardian.

While the blood banking industry is “quite cooperative with each other”, with other suppliers willing to fill in when need be, smaller suppliers are also affected by donation declines.

“Unfortunately, with all these blood donors not coming in to donate as they usually do, it’s happening across the nation,” she said. “We’re preparing for the worst. There are no blood alternatives,” she said. “Patients with leukemia or other cancers, patients who are in a motor vehicle accident or bleeding after childbirth – they need blood.”

Doctors elsewhere have also sounded the alarm over blood shortages.

“I am looking at the refrigerator that contains only one day’s supply of blood for the hospital,” Dr Robertson Davenport, transfusion medicine director at Michigan Medicine in Ann Arbor, said in an American Red Cross statement. “The hospital is full. There are patients who need blood and cannot wait.”

Red Cross officials believe there will be even more donor cancelations, making the blood shortage all the more dire.

While blood drives do entail person-to-person contact, the American Red Cross and public health authorities maintain that donating remains safe. The American Red Cross said it had launched additional safety precautions for donors and staff.

The ramped-up safety measures include temperature checks before donors enter a blood drive or donation center. When possible, staff will also space beds to foster social distancing between donors.

Blankets generally used by platelet, red blood cell, and A-B plasma donors will be washed after each use. Staff will also enhance disinfection of equipment and give out hand sanitizer before and during donation appointments, the organization said.

Blood donation authorities have emphasized blood donors are not in danger of contacting coronavirus from donating.

In a statement, the not-for-profit organization America’s Blood Centers emphasized that “there is no known risk to the safety of the nation’s blood supply” due to coronavirus.