ever wanted to be a superhero?

ever since i was young, i always wanted to be a superhero. it was this childhood dream of saving people. i think at one point of time, every boy had that dream...maybe girls do too.

but obviously i grew up realizing that i did not possess any super powers. sigh. nor was i smart enough to come up with some devices to help me save the world (like batman), nor rich enough to hire someone to do R&D (like ironman), nor agile enough (like spiderman)...in short, i was doomed to a life of normalcy.

but during my 1st 3 months in Outram Institute, i came across my first blood donation drive. it was there that i realized it was my chance to save people! in a small little way. but i always hated the fact that i'm B+ (the most common bloodtype) and not O+ or A type...one saves everyone, the other in very limited supply. sigh.

in the past few years that i've been actively donating apheresis, i've tried to psych people to donate too. but the most common reasons for not donating is that they're scared of the pain...

i really hate to say this..but its such a selfish excuse! we all are scared of pain, who isn't? but if you can endure that ant bite (just for a tiny fraction of a second), you can save the life of someone who needs your blood. what if that person is a loved one, and the only blood that can save him/her is yours...would you hesitate to save him/her?

moreover, whole blood donation can only be done every 3 months, which means, even if you are regular, you can donate only 4 times per year! which is not that bad right..

in a world or even a society like singapore, its easy to have our prejudice against certain groups of people, and i think sometimes that hinders our ability to love them and care for them. take for example, i've never been very keen to care for the elderly because there's a communication barrier (maybe its an excuse), my chinese is substandard, and my dialect repertoire is non-existent...

and therein lies the beauty of blood-donation - the blood does not discriminate between sex, race, religion, language or even age.

in most, if not all, cases, the donors do not even meet the people they donated to..so there is definetely no 'rewards' to be seeked, so they are free of the accusation that its all about the rewards...

for me, i walk away after every donation with the simple satisfaction that i have done a little something to prolong the life of another human being. and that's enough.


Why Blood Donors are Highly Sought After. (taken from HSA website)
Blood contains many life-saving components that can help to treat different illnesses and injuries. For many people, blood donors are their life-line.

Your blood donation could help save the life of an accident victim, a patient with severe anemia, a person undergoing major surgery or even a newborn baby.

The platelets found in blood are used to treat leukemia patients. A single patient often needs platelets from 10 or more donors, all within a short period of time. Add to that the short 5-day lifespan of donated platelets, and you can understand why there is a constant need for platelet donors.

Every hour of the day, 15 units of blood are used in Singapore. We need to collect at least 350 units a day, as a whopping 90,000 units are needed in a year, just to meet the transfusion needs of patients in Singapore.

And with an aging population and more sophisticated medical procedures, the demand of blood is increasing.