Canyon’s Red Cross Club does three blood drives every year. They do one in the fall, winter, and spring. Blood donations are very vital for hospitals everywhere. Blood donors are even in demand right now. Blood drives give hospitals a steady supply of blood for victims of cancer, heart transplants, and fires. Every pint of blood saves up to three lives.
This week our Red Cross Club held a blood drive on Thursday. There are many positives to participating in the school blood drive. Students get free food, free shirts, 10 VCN hours, and gift cards. You must be sixteen years old at least to be eligible for donation. If you are under eighteen years of age, then there is a consent form that you can find in the student center. It takes place in the multi-purpose room and they have nurses come in for the actual blood drawing.
I will take you through my experience getting my blood drawn. First they check your iron, pulse, and blood pressure. Then, you get to the table and they swab your arm with rubbing alcohol to clean it off. After that, they insert the needle that takes the blood into your arm. Then you are laying down while you squeeze something to encourage blood flow. After they fill up the pint, you lay with you arm up and a bandage on the area the blood was drawn after. Next, I layed there for around five minutes and then I was able to go to the snacks table. They said it was very important for me to eat and drink water, since you are a little loopy after.
A reason why so many high schools host blood drives is because many teenagers are healthy and have very healthy blood. Blood drives also offer opportunities for students to get involved in the community. This also gives students exposure to what blood drives are. This could encourage them to continue donating later in life. Donating is so important to hospitals and it is a really good cause. It is really important to donate and the levels of young people donating have dropped significantly in the past decade.
The pandemic decreased the chances for young people to donate. Due to high schools and colleges being closed, many students didn’t have many chances to donate. Also the requirements have been changed to donate. They changed these requirements to decrease chances of iron deficiencies after donating.