There are many unforeseen impacts from the Covid-19 virus. But one impact could directly lead to problems for people needing donated blood.

A spokesperson for the Community Blood Center, with an office in Woodruff, reports they fear people will stop donating blood at the very time many people need it. Dr. Todd Straus is Chief Medical Officer. He says donors are starting to back away...

"We're starting to see drive cancellations, mainly due to businesses, acting with reasonable responses, closing their doors to the public or the schools are shutting down. Areas were we often to blood drives. Not having those opportunities to go into those blood drives have decreased our ability to collect enough blood on a daily basis..."

Dr. Straus says the need for blood continues regardless of what is going on....

"..We have no substitutes for blood. We can only get it from wonderful volunteer blood donors who come in and we need blood daily to support the patients who are in our community. We're going to need to help us out. Call us up, make an appointment so we can continue to serve our community as we do every day..."

He says the blood supply is safe as there are screenings done before donation...

"The blood is very safe, it gets tested for the stuff we normally test it for. The donors are screened to make sure they're still healthy. We have a very high confidence in the safety of the blood supply...."

More information on blood donation is at community blood.org