United Nations' World Health Day is an annual event on April 7 to draw attention to "particular priorities in global health." This year, the theme will focus on urbanization and health. In the city of Trivandrum, capital of the Indian state of Kerala, the focus will be on the need for voluntary blood donation. The organizers, including a local Rotary club, hope to collect blood from 300 donors within just four hours at a Mega Blood Donation camp. (Updated April 4).
According to the website of the World Health Organization, the global goals of this year's WHO campaign are:
- to open up public spaces to health, whether it be activities in parks, town hall meetings, clean-up campaigns, or closing off portions of streets to motorized vehicles in 1000 cities;
- to collect 1000 stories of urban health champions who have taken action and had a significant impact on health in their cities.
With the campaign 1000 cities, 1000 lives, events will be organized worldwide during the week of 7 - 11 April 2010.
In the Kerala capital, Trivandrum , by Mahatma Gandhi once referred to as the Evergreen City of
The Mega Blood Donation camp in
Health and Social Welfare Secretary Usha Titus will inaugurate the function. District Collector Sanjay Kaul will inaugurate the blood donation camp and will be the celebrity blood donor, according to the website expressbuzz.com.
"We have conducted blood donation camps on World Health Day for the last three years", C. Padmakumar, Past President of the Rotary Club of Trivandrum, tells GNBD. He is also the Executive Director of the blood bag factory Terumo Penpol Limited.
The blood banks at the Medical College Hospital, Regional CancerCentre and Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences will collect blood from donors at the camp, according to P. S. Baby, Public Relations Officer at Terumo Penpol Limited. The blood camp will take place at the Hassan Marikar Hall, near the
"We plan to establish a database of the voluntary blood donors who participate in this camp for future use, and we hope that the attendees will continue to donate blood voluntarily. But the main objective of the blood camp on World Health Day is to promote the concept of voluntary blood donation among the general public," P. S. Baby says.
According to Terumu Penpol, the current requirement of blood donors in Trivandrum is 100,000 people.
The objective of a continuing blood dononation drive in the city of Trivandrum is to register 10,000 new blood donors a year by means of: Donor motivation; promotion of the concept of voluntary blood donation and regular voluntary blood donation campaigns.
Terumu Penpol also organised a blood promotion drive on March 22 in association with the Trivandrum Management Association (TMA) and the Trivandrum Citizen's Action Network (T-CAN).
- Promotion of Voluntary Blood Donation. Click here or to DOWNLOADS.
- Blood Donation Camp, what you should do. Click here or go to DOWNLOADS.
Editor's footnote:
Comments regarding this article may be mailed to editor@ourblooddrive.org.
See also news paper articles from the 2008 and the 2009 World Health Day blood camp in
Contact:
C. Padmakumar
Past President of the Rotary Club of Trivandrum
e-mail: pkumar@terumopenpol.com
Executive Director
Terumo Penpol Limited
Blood Bag Factory
Puliyarakonam
Trivandrum 695573
Tel:91-471-3052026/3052021
Fax:91-471-2379931
www.terumopenpol.com