15 June 2013 -- Zimbabwe’s young blood donors were acknowledged and honored as the country joined the rest of the world in celebrating world blood donor day under the theme “Give the gift of life, donate blood.”. This year’s commemorations were held at Mutendi High School in Masvingo. Mutendi High School donat-ed the highest number of blood units in Masvingo province in 2012. The National winners were John Tal-lach High School of Matebeleland North Province. For coming out tops in the province, Mutendi High School received a floating shield, certificate, 2 computers and a printer for the school, while John Tallach received a floating shield, certificate, 4 computers, a printer, and a laptop.

In his speech to mark the day, the CEO of the Na-tional Blood Services Zimbabwe (NBSZ), Mr David Mvere, paid tribute to the young blood do-nors from Mutendi High School, and congratulated them for donating more blood than any other school in the province. He said the NBSZ has great pride with regard to the involvement of young blood donors and urged the young donors to look after their health so that they can continue donat-ing safe blood.

Also present at the commemoration were some former Ministers of Health and Child Welfare. These were Dr (Brigadier General) Felix Muche-mwa who was Minister of Health from 1988 to 1989, and Dr Timothy Stamps who was Minister of Health from 1990 to 2002.

In a statement to mark the day, Dr Muchemwa said the Ministry of Health and Child Welfare appreciates young blood donors for supplying the nation with adequate and safe blood. He said in Zimbabwe young donors aged 16—29 years form the backbone of blood donation. He said the message for the day is that blood is life, so its supply must be maintained. He, there-fore, urged all young donors to continue donat-ing safe blood so that the blood bank always has sufficient stocks to support life. The former Min-ister also acknowledged those adult donors pre-sent who continue to make sure the country has adequate supplies of safe blood. Some of the adult donors who donated over 25 units of blood were honored and received certificates and min-iature shields.

Mrs Julias from WCO Zimbabwe read the Re-gional Director’s speech on behalf of WHO Representative, Dr David Okello. The speech emphasized the importance of collecting more blood from voluntary donors and ensuring its availability and accessibility to a large number of people to save more lives. The speech also hailed voluntary non-remunerated blood donors, and expressed hope that voluntary blood donors will form the basis of donors that provides the safest possible blood for use in health facilities wherever and whenever it is needed in all coun-tries of the African Region.

For more information contact :

Wendy Julias
E-mail: juliasw [at] who.int