World Blood Donor Day 2024 – “20 years of celebrating giving: Thank you, blood donors!” (2024)

In 2005, the World Health Assembly designated June 14 as World Blood Donor Day. Since then, every year countries around the world have observed this day to thank blood donors for their noble acts and to create awareness to promote voluntary and unpaid blood donations to ensure sufficient safe blood supplies. The year 2024 marks the 20th anniversary of World Blood Donor Day and this year’s global campaign carries the slogan: “20 years of celebrating giving: Thank you, blood donors!”. It serves as an opportunity to express gratitude to all blood donors and calls for action, motivating more individuals to join the global movement of blood donation.

The safest blood donors are Voluntary, Non-Remunerated (unpaid) blood Donors (VNRD) from low-risk populations. World Health Organization’s (WHO) goal is for all countries to obtain all their blood supplies through VNRDs. Globally around 118 million blood donations occurred in 2018, out of which 95.2 million were whole blood donations. At a global level the percentage of blood donations originating from VNRDs was 82.8% while the corresponding figure for the WHO South-East Asia (SEA) Region was only 79.1%.

Sri Lanka has a well-established nationally coordinated blood transfusion service where all blood and blood components are collected from VNRDs from low-risk populations. Sri Lanka is among the only three countries in WHO SEA Region to have 100% of its blood donations originating from VNRDs, with Thailand and Democratic People’s Republic of Korea being the other countries. In Sri Lanka quality-assured testing of all donated blood, and compatibility testing are ensured, and an effective monitoring and evaluation (haemovigilance) mechanisms are in place.

World Health Organization Sri Lanka has been providing critical support to strengthen the blood transfusion services in the country. In 2023, WHO Sri Lanka supported the National Blood Transfusion Services (NBTS) to conduct capacity building programmes for medical laboratory technologists on good manufacturing practices, training for mobile blood donation teams on blood collection, processing and issuing, and improving capacities for screening for Transfusion Transmissible Infections (TTI) such as Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C and Syphilis. Further support was extended to conduct hospital transfusion committee meetings in selected districts which are essential in establishing safe blood practices across the country, and also to conduct a review programme at the national level on blood group incompatible transfusions with the aim of identifying corrective measures. Furthermore, NBTS is keen to strengthen its capacity to become a regional external quality assurance service provider for quality-assured testing of all donated blood for TTI, and for blood group incompatibility. WHO supported this process which was initiated in 2023, and phase II of the activity will continue in 2024/25.

Commemoration of the World Blood Donor Day provides an opportunity for all stakeholders involved to reaffirm their commitment towards blood safety and to thank the altruistic acts of selflessness of voluntary blood donors and celebrate life and humanity. In this philanthropic act, every stakeholder at the sub-national, national, regional, and global levels must come together to invest in, strengthen, and sustain national blood transfusion programmes. WHO will continue to support Sri Lanka in further strengthening of its blood transfusion services to ensure the availability of safe blood and blood products to all who need it.