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One of the magnitudes that help measure the solidarity of a society is the donor registry. And the Valencian Community has a significant number. In 2023, 116,635 people gave their blood. Together they would form the fifth Valencian capital. That is the ‘city of donors’. That city would be formed by a 55% of men and 44% of womenbecause women can only donate three times a year and men, four. By age groups, and24.2% of donors are between 18 and 35 years old; the 36 to 45 age group accounted for 21.3%; those aged between 46 and 65 years old represented 54.3 % and those over 65 years old 0.2%. The city is also constantly growing: last year 7,895 new donors were registered. And with each donation they contribute to saving lives, to the point that they deserve recognition, however symbolic it may be.

The Transfusion Center of the Valencian Community has just put out to tender the contract for the supply of gifts for blood donors and collaborators. It is put out to tender for a value of one million euros, taxes included, to supply these objects for three years starting on November 1st. The object of the contract is to grant “a token of gratitude for the voluntary and altruistic act” of donation, a way of creating loyalty and generating the memory that they can donate again, but without the detail distorting the fact of the free nature of the act of donation, that is, without commercializing this action.

The range of gifts for those who donate a litre or two of blood on a regular basis is therefore varied but modest. The contract is, in fact, divided into several lots. The first includes almost 45,000 units of products such as USB bracelets, travel hairbrushes or neck warmers. It also includes nearly one hundred thousand reusable cups, drawstring backpacks, transparent toiletry bags or multitasking pens.This lot, with the highest budget, is up for tender for 568,000 euros.

Donation point in a shopping centre in Valencia. / Francisco Calabuig

An expensive operation

The second lot includes 39,000 units of sunglasses, fans, cooler backpacks, bags, mousepad calendars or cardboard calendars. For the Christmas season, 13,500 Christmas candles and 13,500 lip balms are also up for auction. All for 225,000 euros. There is a third batch, which seems to be geared towards the summer months. There are 13,500 towel-sarongs, 42,000 T-shirts and 21,165 checkered scarves, for 170,000 euros. Finally, the fourth batch is for the ‘champions’ of blood donation: There are 5,300 crystal trophies with cases, valued at almost 38,000 euros.

The donation process, an essential act for thousands of patients, has a significant cost. Not only in transport vehicles, clinical material and equipment, the most expensive, but also in the care of the donors themselves. It is the price of saving lives.

The mobile teams based in the three Transfusion Centres (Valencia, Alicante and Castelló) carry out daily blood extractions in the different places to which they travel. In addition to these details of loyalty, donors are provided with food to facilitate their recovery, both solid foods (rosquilletas, dehydrated fruit, fartons, nuts) and liquids (water, zero cola drinks or horchata). A few days ago, precisely, The supply of 466,667 bottles of water was also awarded for 96,000 euros..