June 13, 2023
Māori needed for blood and bone donations
Māori and Pasifika are being urged not only to give blood, but also to register as potential bone marrow donors.
Its Blood Donor Week, and the Blood Service says with an ageing population and growing demand, it needs 40-thousand more donors to avoid the need to import blood.
Spokesperson Asuka Burge says it also hopes Maori and Pasifika blood donors will join the bone marrow register, which desperately needs more Polynesian donors.
“Bone marrow is actually related to your tissue type, and hence your ethnicity – and that’s why we’d really love to encourage more Maori donors to come forward and join the bone marrow registry at the same time, because you could be that one-in-a-million match for someone who is going through leukaemia and needs bone marrow as ,” Ms Burge says.