A doctor explained the significance of blood donation by a blood donor

Some people do not want to donate blood because of the desire to help a particular person. Pavel Trakhtman, MD, head of the transfusiology department of the Dmitry Rogachev Children's Medical Center and one of the experts of the "+Ya" educational project, told Izvestia on November 26.

The expert noted that there are no safe and available analogs of human blood yet.

"There are not as many donors in our country as it may seem: 1.4 million for 146 million population - 1%. And to fully satisfy the need of hospitals in blood for transfusions, for every 1,000 people there should be 40 donations per year. Today this figure in Russia is 14-17. By the way, in Europe this figure is 25-27, and in the U.S. and Canada - 35-40," - said the transfusiologist.

According to him, over the last decades doctors have learned to use blood without losses: earlier during transfusion specialists had to collect whole blood and only then divide it into components. The process was very complicated, the blood could not always be fully utilized due to the limited shelf life. Nowadays, donations are carried out using the apheresis method: a donor can give not whole blood, but exactly the component that a particular patient needs at the moment.

"In addition, donation is not only assistance during transfusion. Blood plasma is used to produce essential medicines - clotting factors, albumin, immunoglobulins and others," Trachtman added.

As a result, thanks to the achievements of modern science and technology, one donor can help several patients at the same time. Therefore, donating blood for a specific person is an irrational waste of a valuable resource that can save the lives of a large number of people at once, the expert emphasized.

Earlier, on April 20, Olga Ulankina, a medical expert of the laboratory "Hemotest", told "Izvestia" that not everyone can donate blood. Thus, it is forbidden to donate to people suffering from some incurable infectious diseases (HIV, hepatitis B and C), because in this case it is possible to infect the recipient (the person to whom the blood is transfused). In addition, the absolute contraindications include tuberculosis, bronchial asthma, blood diseases.