On World Blood Donor Day today, the Health Ministry signed a pact with the Tamil Nadu government to set up a state-of-the-art centre of excellence in transfusion medicine.
With the average blood donation rate in India being 0.8, which is lower than those in many high-income countries leading to a shortfall in quantum and access to safe blood, these centres will procure blood through 100 per cent voluntary blood donation.
It is part of the Metro Blood Bank Project, a central scheme under the ministry in which such centres will come up in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata also.
These centres will have state-of-the-art technology in transfusion medicine for component separation, processing of blood and quality systems.
The MoU was signed between J Radhakrishnan, Health Secretary Tamil Nadu and C V Dharma Rao, Joint Secretary, NACO under Health Ministry in the pressence of Union Secretary B P Sharma and Additional Secretary N S Kang.
The agreement formalises central government support to set up and run these centres in the state of Tamil Nadu, for which land has been provided free-of-cost by the state.
The centre has approved an outlay of approximately Rs 200 crore per centre for this.
"The excess of plasma generated will be sent for fractionation and help to produce life-saving costly plasma- derived medicines like albumin, clotting factors etc, for which the country presently relies on imports.
"In addition, this will also set up a revenue generation model to offset the operating costs," Sharma said.
Health Ministry has accorded approval for the first phase, wherein these facilities will come up in Chennai and Delhi.
India collects about 10 million blood donations every year and nearly 70 per cent of these donations are collected through voluntary non-remunerated donors.
The theme of this year's World Blood Donor Day is 'blood connects us all' and the slogan 'share life, give blood', also draws attention to the unparalleled role of non-remunerated voluntary blood donation in promoting community cohesion.
"These centres will procure blood through 100 per cent voluntary blood donation", Kang said.
Voluntary, unpaid blood donations must be increased rapidly in more than half the world's countries in order to ensure a reliable supply of safe blood for patients whose lives depend on it, WHO had said yesterday.
