SunCoast Blood Centers looks for donations

Flooded roads weren't going to stop SunCoast Blood Centers in Lakewood Ranch from getting blood to Sarasota Memorial Hospital.

Joan Leonard, a community liaison for SunCoast Blood Centers, said a staff member drove the units of blood in his pick-up truck from the Lakewood Ranch center to the hospital after Hurricane Debby dumped huge amounts of rain on Sarasota and Manatee counties.

Leonard said the blood centers canceled drives and shut down Aug. 4 and half a day Aug. 5 as a result of Hurricane Debby. Sun Coast Blood Centers already was experiencing a shortage, but the hurricane further depleted supply, she said. 

“Summer is always our worst collection time, so we went into the weekend with a low inventory, which got even lower,” she said. 

SunCoast Blood Centers is trying different ways to boost its inventory, especially as hurricane season continues. 

Leonard said the nonprofit still hasn’t returned to pre-COVID-19 numbers of donations. Nationwide, Leonard said 6% of the population was donating blood before the pandemic, but now only 3% of the population is donating. 

The local goal is to receive 40,000 donated units of red blood cells, but the nonprofit has been averaging 2,400 donated units for the past three months. 

Leonard said if everyone donated three times per year, there would never be a shortage. 

“That’s three hours of your time in a year,” she said. 

Leonard said the blood shortage mostly will affect people who need regular transfusions. The shortage also could cause elective surgeries to be postponed if not enough blood is available. 

“This is an area where we have such good medical services,” she said. “People come here for hip and knee surgeries, but all those surgeries need blood on the shelf just in case.”

Before the pandemic, Leonard said blood centers would send blood across the country to cover shortages in cases of natural disasters like hurricanes or incidents such as the nightclub shooting in Orlando. Now, the country is experiencing shortages and blood centers aren’t able to support each other, she said.  

To reach the 19 to 45 year old age range donors, SunCoast Blood Centers is raffling off two tickets to Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour concert Oct. 20 in Miami. 

Anyone who donates blood up to Sept. 15 will be entered into the raffle.

Leonard said the blood centers have tapped into the 16 to 18 year old range through partnerships with 14 high schools, but after 18, the number of donors drops off.

The 19 to 45 year old age range has fewer donors for various reasons, Leonard said, including being busy raising kids, advancing their careers or tackling adult responsibilities. 

During the summer Olympics, which took place July 30 to Aug. 11, SunCoast Blood Centers was celebrating their own Olympians, the donors. 

Walking into the Lakewood Ranch center, a podium is ready for the donors to collect their gold medals.

“We try to say that it’s not just our athletes in life that are superheroes, but that the average person can always be a superhero,” Leonard said.