New Jersey Blood Services/New York Blood Center (NYBC) has declared a blood emergency. The organization is asking people across New York City, the Hudson Valley, Long Island and New Jersey to donate blood to help replenish the blood supply for hospitals throughout the area.

In order to maintain a safe blood supply, a seven-day inventory of all blood types must be continually replenished. Right now, reserves are below that minimum.

These low levels are particularly dangerous leading into summer months, when people are less likely to donate blood as schools go on summer break and families take vacations. The best preparation for life-threatening situations is having blood on hospital shelves in advance.

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Our appeal happens to coincide with World Blood Donor Day, which is Thursday, June 14, and celebrates volunteer blood donors for their life-saving gifts. This year it falls on the anniversary of the 2017 shooting at the congressional baseball practice. To recognize the importance of blood donations, members of the Republican and Democrat congressional baseball teams have joined together in a bipartisan, bicameral effort to promote World Blood Donor Day and the vital work of independent blood centers such as NYBC.

“Every single day, blood donations help save lives – and right now, the need is critical,” said Andrea Cefarelli, Senior Executive Director of Donor Recruitment for New York Blood Center. “We’re calling on everyone to do what they can to spread the word, host a blood drive or simply take an hour out of their day to donate.”

Community members are encouraged to find time to donate blood at a NYBC donor center or convenient mobile blood drive, especially donors with O negative and B negative blood types. O negative blood donors are considered “universal,” and their blood type is needed most readily in trauma situations and emergency rooms across the country. B negative is a particularly rare blood type.

Companies, organizations, and community groups are also encouraged to host a blood drive this summer to help rebuild the blood supply, especially during the months of July and August.

In just 60 minutes, you can donate one pint of blood and Save a Life, Right Here, Right Now in your own community. About one in seven hospital admissions requires a blood transfusion, and with a limited shelf life, supplies must be continually replenished. Those in need include: cancer patients, accident, burn, or trauma victims, newborn babies and their mothers, transplant recipients, surgery patients, chronically transfused patients suffering from sickle cell disease or thalassemia, and many more.





How to help:

Donate blood or platelets at a donor center. Donate at a mobile blood drive. Host a blood drive in your community of at your organization. Educate others in your family, community, and organization about blood donations, and encourage them to donate themselves and/or host a blood drive. Promote the need for blood donors on social media.

For more information on where to donate or how to set up your own drive, visit www.nybloodcenter.org/blood or call 1-800-933-2566.

About New York Blood Center: Founded in 1964, New York Blood Center (NYBC) is a nonprofit organization that is one of the largest independent, community-based blood centers in the world. NYBC, along with its partner organizations Community Blood Center of Kansas City, Missouri (CBC), Innovative Blood Resources (IBR), Blood Bank of Delmarva (BBD), and Rhode Island Blood Center (RIBC), collect approximately 4,000 units of blood products each day and serve local communities of more than 45 million people in the Tri-State area (NY, NJ, CT), Mid Atlantic area (PA, DE, MD), the Kansas City metropolitan area, Minnesota, Nebraska, Rhode Island, and Southern New England. NYBC and its partners also provide a wide array of transfusion-related medical services, including Comprehensive Cell Solutions, the National Center for Blood Group Genomics, the National Cord Blood Program, and the Lindsley F. Kimball Research Institute, which — among other milestones — developed the Hepatitis B vaccine and a patented solvent detergent plasma process innovating blood-purification technology worldwide.

Website: www.nybloodcenter.org

Facebook: www.facebook.com/newyorkbloodcenter

Twitter: @NYBloodCenter

Instagram: @newyorkbloodcenter