DETROIT (Jan. 30, 2024) – The American Red Cross said Tuesday that its national blood supply remains critically low as severe weather throughout January has hampered efforts to rebuild the supply.

Thousands of blood and platelet donations have gone uncollected nationally due to severe weather, said David Mair, M.D. chief medical officer of Blood Services for the Red Cross East Central Bay and Central Atlantic divisions.

In Michigan, 11 blood drives were cancelled due to severe weather in the last two weeks. As a result, 285 units of blood went uncollected.

“Snow, ice and extreme temperatures have made it tougher to move vital blood products across the Red Cross network,” Dr. Mair said. “To recover from this blood shortage, we need to exceed the 12,500 donations we typically collect every day to meet the needs of patients across the country.”

Dr. Mair’s remarks came during a virtual news briefing that updated the emergency blood shortage the Red Cross announced on Jan. 8. Also making remarks were Jennifer Jones, M.D., assistant professor of Transfusion Medicine at Michigan Medicine, the University of Michigan’s academic medical center, and Michelle Maxson, R.N., senior manager of Trauma Services at Hurley Medical Center.  

As the single largest blood supplier in the country, being able to collect enough blood donations to meet the needs of patients is vitally important to the Red Cross mission, Dr. Mair said.

“Having a sufficient blood supply is critical to ensuring patients have access to lifesaving blood,” he said. “It is
the blood on the shelves made possible by blood donors that truly helps in times of emergency.”

Dr. Jones and Maxson spoke of the importance of having a well-stocked inventory of blood products that is critical to their hospitals maintaining their high level of quality and care. Dr. Jones and Maxson joined Dr. Mair in urging people who are eligible to donate blood to do so.  

On average every week or two at Michigan Medicine,  the supply of certain blood products like platelets reach  such low levels that doctors must evaluate whether patients require a blood product immediately or can  wait until the inventory improves, Dr. Jones said. In the past year, the hospital’s need for platelets has continued to increase.  

“Platelets are a vital part of the blood that prevents bleeding,” Dr. Jones said. “On a day-to-day basis, as we’re walking around in our lives, platelets also help us stop bleeding if we become injured. Patients can develop low platelets under certain circumstances like if someone has a cancer diagnosis and they are recovering from chemotherapy, if patients are critically ill in the ICU (intensive care unit) and that can include newborn babies or patients that require large surgeries like aortic repairs, or an organ transplant, or a neurosurgery.

“Typically we can treat these patients by giving them a platelet transfusion but when we’re in a shortage situation, we are triaging and sometimes these transfusions get delayed. Or, we can do things like take a unit (of blood), break it in half, and then give it to patients so they get some instead of none at all. Those practices are suboptimal, but they are required to defend our inventory and maintain it at a sustainable level.”

Hurley Medical Center is a Level One trauma center and receive patient transfers from more than 40 hospitals in the northern and eastern parts of the state. Many of these patients require blood transfusions to save their life, Maxson said.

“We do depend on having an adequate supply of blood available at a minutes notice when needed for a bleeding patient,” Maxson said. “In certain situations, trauma patients do require large amounts of blood products, which further contribute to the shortages that we have been seeing. We depend on the Red Cross to replenish the blood that we have available for use for our patients. With the shortages they’re experiencing,
this makes it challenging for us to get the blood replenished.”

Patients who are eligible to donate have three options to make an appointment:

·      Use the Red Cross Blood Donor App

·      Go to RedCrossBlood.org

·      Call 1-800-RED CROSS

Wednesday, Jan. 31, is the last day to make a donation and be entered to win a trip for 2 to the Super Bowl in February. This includes roundtrip airfare, 3-night hotel stay and $1,000 gift card. Donors who give in February will receive a $20 Amazon gift card by email.

To thank donors who give blood, the Red Cross has launched a Blood Donor Rewards program. Retroactive to Jan. 1, 2024, all donors will now earn points for each donation and can redeem them for e-gift cards or
exclusive Red Cross merchandise.

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MEDIA CONTACT: David Olejarz / david.olejarz@redcross.org / 313-303-0606

About the American Red Cross: 

The American Red Cross shelters, feeds and provides comfort to victims of disasters; supplies about 40% of the nation’s blood; teaches skills that save lives; distributes international humanitarian aid; and supports veterans, military members and their families. The Red Cross is a nonprofit organization that depends on volunteers and the generosity of the American public to deliver its mission. For more information, please visit redcross.org or CruzRojaAmericana.org, or follow us on social media.