DAYTON – More than 234 donors filled the Dayton Community Blood Center on Jan. 3 for the January Ohio Blood Donor Awareness Month Kickoff Blood Drive.
They helped erase a brief shortage of type O and B-negative blood, replenished the holiday blood supply and launched a new year of saving lives.
January Ohio Blood Donor Awareness Month began the day after New Year’s with busy blood drives in Botkins, Piqua, Liberty, Springboro and Springfield. The Miami Valley’s observance officially got underway with the Blood Donor Month Kickoff Blood Drive. The blood drive continued to Jan. 4 at the Dayton CBC.
State Sen. Stephen Huffman (R-5th District) is an emergency room physician and a life-long blood donor who introduced House Bill 252 to designate January as Blood Donor Awareness Month in Ohio. The process began in the summer of 2017, it was signed into law in February 2018 and the first celebration was January 2019.
The first goal of the Donor Month Kickoff Blood Drive was to help boost the blood supply after the holidays with no mobile blood drives on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day. It also was an opportunity to emphasize CBC’s strategic goals for 2020:
• CBC must increase blood donations in 2020 in order to provide blood to more hospitals outside its traditional 15-county service area. CBC must expand its hospital partnerships to remain viable in the blood industry and to continue serving the Miami Valley region.
• This will include increasing whole blood donations, continued focus on recruiting new platelet and plasma donors and a new emphasis on double red blood cell donations.
• In 2020 CBC seeks to harness the spirit and strength of the Dayton Strong movement to inspire more blood donors and engage more blood drive sponsors, especially in the downtown Dayton community.
