The opening of the tribute has been carried out by the president of Adona, Antón Zubasti, who told the attendees that “you are the soul of the donation that we want to project to the rest of society.” He highlighted the values of “solidarity, altruism and anonymity” behind blood donation and stressed that “within each one of you there is a great story of commitment and dedication to people you do not know but who you know need you” .
“Being a donor is an attitude in life, wanting to get involved in the lives of others without wanting anything in return”, has valued Zubasti, who has highlighted the “feeling of satisfaction -of the donor- for the duty fulfilled.” “Altruism, solidarity and perseverance continue to be present values in our society,” he added.
“We come from hard and long months that have turned our lives upside down,” said Zubasti, who recalled “all the people who have left us throughout these months,” especially the member of the board of Adona Joaquín Donate.
The president of Adona has stressed that “the greatest concern” of hospitals is to make sure they have the necessary blood components and has pointed out that blood “is essential to have a quality health system.”
However, he has indicated that transfusions “are daily events” and that “there is less and less talk about donation and blood donors.” And he remarked that “today it cannot be manufactured” and that “we are deficient” in some blood components “.
22,966 DONATIONS IN 2020, THE HIGHEST AVERAGE IN THE STATE
The tribute was closed by the Minister of Health, Santos Induráin, who has described the honorees as “an extraordinary benchmark of altruism, solidarity, commitment, dedication, dedication and civility” and has transferred “the gratitude of Navarre society for your generosity “.
As indicated, Navarra received a total of 22,966 donations of blood and apheresis in 2020, data that represents “a slight decrease” with respect to 2019 but that “reflects a stability in donations, even more so if the impact is taken into account. at all levels that the Covid-19 pandemic has meant during these 18 months “.
In this sense, he highlighted that Navarra “presented the highest average of donations per donor in the entire State, located at 1.78 donations per donor.” “They are really good data but we cannot lower our guard,” said the counselor, who pointed out that one of Adona’s challenges is “to achieve self-sufficiency in blood components.” In this regard, he explained that in Navarra “we are self-sufficient in red blood cells and almost self-sufficient in platelets, but, like the rest of Europe, very deficient in plasma.”
In these months of pandemic, Induráin has indicated, “a social wear has been reflected in general that surely has also affected the donation” to which is added, as an association, the “population aging: the older the age of the population, there are fewer young citizens of donor age and more elderly population that is more likely to need a transfusion of any blood component. ” “A circle that we all have to try to break,” said the counselor.
In this sense, he explained that the average age of the people who made donations in 2020 was 43.5 years, an age that rises to 48.7 years in the case of apheresis. A context in which it is framed, has highlighted, Adona’s campaigns in universities to promote donation among youth and that “has had a broad response.”
Induráin has acknowledged that the pandemic “has not been easy for your association either; while the needs for red blood cells seem to be stagnant, those for platelets and plasma have continued to grow despite the pandemic situation.” And he has appreciated the “great effort” of Adona for “recovering the apheresis donation rate in order to meet the needs of these two components -platelets and plasma-“, a type of donation that requires, on the one hand, “the effort and expertise of the Bank’s extraction teams of Blood to select the ideal donor “and, on the other hand,” adjust the needs to the number of donors available and the human and material resources necessary. “
He stressed that “during the months of confinement you have worked in the continuous training of Adona volunteers as message transmitters to meet the needs of donors, developing an important task to inform and give confidence to the donors and manage the local of donation, that in many occasions had been closed or had been destined to other uses “.
Along the same lines, it has valued continuing education projects aimed at the population with the aim of “creating a positive disposition towards donating blood but also donating organs and tissues.”
The counselor stressed that the Department of Health will continue to collaborate with Adona to carry out donation promotion and support activities in accordance with the provisions of the Foral Hemotherapy Plan, with the aim of achieving “adequate coverage of the needs of hemotherapy products in the centers and in all health services of the Autonomous Community “. “It would be good if, between all of us, we manage to turn blood donation into a social act,” he concluded.
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