COLUMBUS, Ga. (WRBL)— The Veterans of Foreign Wars provides assistance and support to America’s service members, veterans and their families. Monday, members of local Post 665 joined together to continue their support for fellow Americans.
According to the American Red Cross, every two seconds someone in the U.S. needs blood or platelets. In fact, one car accident victim can require up to 100 units of blood; and one donation can help save up to three lives.
American Red Cross Account Manager Johnny Williams says while blood supplies are in no shortage, their blood supply is affected by storms like the ones that swept through Troup, Meriwether, Barbour and Chambers counties on Jan. 12, 2023.
“Storms do affect the collections of blood, because when a storm moves through an area, there may have been already regularly scheduled blood drives in those areas that had to cancel due to inclement weather. So that means that was blood we were going to collect that we didn’t get to collect,” Williams said.
For the American Red Cross to keep up with their supply and demand of blood, they need to bring in about 13,000 units per day. That’s where members of Post 665 and The Mission Continues recognized a need.
“The importance of giving blood means to save a life. We always talk about having change and making change, but we have to be the change,” The Mission Continues Platoon Leader LaKesha Stringer said.
Williams says while all blood types are important, the most needed blood type is O-negative because 80% of patients can receive it. Williams encourages people to donate blood.
“It’s really an easy process. It only takes less than an hour from beginning to end of registration, a little bit of health history, donate the blood and then you want to recover a little bit,” Williams said. “The best thing about it is that warm feeling inside that, you know, that that one donation you just did could have saved up to three lives.”
Click here to find out where to donate blood.