
Hanoi (VNA) - The National Steering Committee for Voluntary Blood Donation has set a goal to collect over 1.5 million bloodunits in 2021, with 99 percent of which donated by volunteers, according to Le Gia Tien, Director of the committee's Standing Office.
Speaking at a conference to review the voluntaryblood donation campaign in 2020 and set tasks for 2021 in Hanoi on January15, Tien said the rate of blood donors in the population is expected to reach 1.6 percent, respectively, in the year.
To that end, application of information technologies willbe promoted in communication activities in order to raise public awarenessabout the benefits of voluntary blood donation and safe blood transfusion, andeffectively manage blood givers, Tien noted.
Last year, the mobilisationof people to voluntarily donate blood faced many obstacles due to the COVID-19 pandemic,Tien said. He, however, stressed that with many initiatives and great efforts toovercome difficulties, the Steering Committee for Voluntary Blood Donation receivedapproximately 1.4 million units of blood, helping millions of patients,especially amid the pandemic.
Themajority of blood units were donated by volunteers, equivalent to nearly1.5 percent of the population. Half of the givers donated theirblood more than once.
During the year, the Steering Committee for Voluntary Blood Donation at all levels organised more than 13,000communication campaigns on voluntary blood donation with more than 1.6 millionparticipants.
So far, over 4,000 clubs of blood donors with over125,000 members have been established nationwide. More than 25,800 individuals,families and collectives were honoured in recognition of their achievements involuntary blood donation./.