Obviously if this succeeds, then the life-saving implications are tremendous. It would become practical to keep a stock of lab-grown blood in ambulances, as it can just be rotated out when it expires, but the immediate availability of blood in the field can mean the difference between life and death.
I just hope that blood donation doesn't go away as a result. There are both ethical and personal benefits - ethical, because it's a visceral experience of doing something good for society that most people can do, and with little effort; personal, because of potential health benefits from donating blood, see e.g. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle... .
I don’t think this is the right way to think about it. If donating blood is no longer a useful societal good, then there are no ethical benefits. If there are health benefits to bloodletting, then we can do that independently of donating the blood.
Well I do hope that this succeeds beyond the wildest expectations, and blood-donations go the way of the horse[^1]. We can cultivate ethics in everything else.
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[^1]: We still have horses. So there is a chance some people will become recreational vampire-feeders and some people will adopt vampirism as a hobby. Fine, I won't judge.
While your article calls out PFAS in firefighters, there are people who for other reasons need blood letting. It's one of my biggest gripes with blood donation in the US is that those people are prohibited from donating blood because they're getting "value" from doing so (instead of having to pay somebody to draw their blood the red cross would be drawing it for free -- note, the blood isn't unusable for any other reason than drawing it provides value to the donater).
Like you have a population that must give blood by some means and regularly the various blood banks complain about a shortage and they never seem to be able to put two and two together ...
I would love to see more donor centers allow hemochromatosis patients to donate.
I think there is not actually regulatory ban. Last I looked into this, it was because of the conflict of interest - the FDA requires blood from donors with hemochromatosis be labeled as such.
And even that requirement can be worked around. See, for example, https://clinicalcenter.nih.gov/blooddonor/donationtypes/hemo.... Background, most centers charge for therapeutic phlebotomy but obviously not for volunteer blood donation. The exception is permissable if the center agrees to allow the patient's blood to be drawn for free, whether or not they would qualify as a blood donor.
The issue with "getting value" from donating is that people sometimes lie in order to be able to get that value. The downstream issues can be very painful -
I have personally taken care of patients who got HIV or hepatitis from blood transfusion. I am pretty sure any of them would emphatically agree it is important to ensure the blood supply is as safe as possible.
So it can be done, but it has to be done carefully.
This actually reversed just this year, with most major blood banks (following the example of the Red Cross) now allowing donations from diagnosed hemochromatosis patients.
>>then the life-saving implications are tremendous
Are people in medical settings dying because of a lack of blood? It seems that unless you're in some exotic blood group you will likely find a compatible donor, and it is not clear as to severity of an imperfect match to rarer groups like the mentioned "Bombay" group.
Your parent is theorizing that people in edge medical settings are. For example, an EMT might not be able to give you a transfusion while you lay bleeding in the dirt, because they may not have twenty units of blood to spare in the bus.
Right idea, but I think maybe you may have used the wrong word.
The donation is to get antibodies.
Antigens are are the stimulus that causes the body to form antibodies.
We give the Rh- mom antibodies so they bind to antigens on the blood from baby; the idea being that "hiding" the antigens from mom's immune system will prevent her from making her own antibodies.
also financial: some people rely on blood donations for extra cash to pay for food and bills. Though, there are better ways to give people opportunities…
It does with respect to how frequently you're able to donate. In the UK, blood donation can be no more frequent than once every 12 weeks (for men). Plasma can be donated up to once every 2 weeks.
Germany doesn't. There are some for-profit options for donating blood in Germany but the most widely know way to give blood is with the German Red Cross, which does not pay donors unless you consider a small meal or the occasional swag (e.g. squishy balls) "payment".
As I understand it, some hospitals offer payment for blood donations but if you want to get paid the most reliable options are probably pharmaceutical companies. By number of donors, both are probably eclipsed by the Red Cross though, which by its nature heavily relies on volunteer work.
We're not disagreeing. These are (university) hospitals and corporations. I've seen numbers indicating that 70% to 80% of blood donations in Germany are done via the German Red Cross. The Red Cross does not pay money for blood donations.
Pre-COVID the German Red Cross often would have a buffet lunch typically consisting of sandwiches and fruit for donors. Since then they seem to have moved to prepackaged lunches and branded giveaways. But never cash money.
As a German, I now several people here who donate blood and get paid money for it (e.g. here https://www.blutspendedienst-owl.de/blutspende.html), but more people do indeed donate plasma since they get more money per session and can donate more often (e.g. here: https://www.cslplasma.de/faqs but I don't see their monetary rewards on the page anywhere).
If you wait for the next blood donation to be advertised for you, it will be from the Red Cross or similar and you get a free sandwich or something to that effect. If you actively search for options to donate, chances are it will be at the local hospital that will pay you around 20€ for it and offer much more frequent options.
I just hope that blood donation doesn't go away as a result. There are both ethical and personal benefits - ethical, because it's a visceral experience of doing something good for society that most people can do, and with little effort; personal, because of potential health benefits from donating blood, see e.g. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle... .