Blood services     Improving the safety of the world's blood supply

Every day millions of people require blood transfusions. Most transfusions save lives, but they can also put a patient at risk if blood is contaminated by an infectious disease. Up to 5 per cent of HIV infections in the developing world, for example, may still be due to transfusion of contaminated blood. Maintaining a safe blood supply, therefore, is in the interest of every public health official.
Safe blood may generally be described as having no traces of viruses, parasites, drugs, alcohol, chemical substances or other factors that may cause harm to the recipient. A crucial element in ensuring safety is to know as much as possible about the source of donated blood.
A system of voluntary, regular non-remunerated blood donation is widely recognized as a critical factor in quality blood service delivery. Blood coming from family or replacement donors and especially paid donors is known to have a higher incidence and prevalence of transfusion-transmissible infections. Blood coming from a voluntary system is, in general, less likely to contain HIV, hepatitis B or other harmful factors.

Not only is the blood likely to be safer from voluntary donors but such a system has another advantage: it cuts down on the amount of blood that has to be discarded because of evidence of infectious disease markers in that way reducing the cost of collection programmes.

More than 75 million units of blood are collected annually worldwide. Red Cross and Red Crescent societies gather directly an estimated 30 per cent while another 30 per cent is donated through organizations and services supported by National Societies. To ensure the safety of the blood supply, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies has made the elimination of the use of paid donors and the conversion of family and replacement donors to voluntary ones a high priority.