One hour, one pint, three lives

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Samuel Taylor
  • 436th Airlift Wing Public Affairs
DOVER AIR FORCE BASE, Del. --  On Aug. 6, more than 100 service members, dependants and retirees at Dover Air Force Base, Del., came together and donated 80 pints of usable blood to the Armed Services Blood Program; within approximately 24 hours, that blood was on a plane headed downrange to wounded warriors awaiting the blood transfusion that would save their life.

Team Dover had delivered the gift of hope, nearly doubling the ASBP's weekly blood-donation quota for all federal facilities on its own. For Airman 1st Class Joseph Davis, Team Dover's blood drive organizer, it was a job well done.

"I was proud to see the blood and know where it is going," said Davis. "Blood is a lifeline; it is a way for stateside service members to fight back against the enemy." Davis has donated blood more than 20 times.

How do blood donations fight back against the enemy? Chiefly by reducing the numbers of service members killed by excessive blood loss. Due to blood donations from service members, dependants and retirees, the survival rate for service members in danger of fatal blood loss is approximately 98 percent - the highest in history.

Military-to-military blood drives, like those administered by the ASBP, serve a primary mission of shipping a quota of 43 units - one pint of blood is considered one "unit;" each unit can save up to three lives - to service members downrange. Their secondary mission is to support the wounded troops undergoing treatment and recovery at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., and, to a lesser extent, Joint Base Andrews, Md., and Fort Belvoir, Va. Their tertiary mission is to support military dependants and retirees.

Approximately 200 units of blood are transfused at WRNMMC, JB Andrews and Fort Belvoir each week.

To support the demand for so much blood, the ASBP calls on federal facilities like Dover AFB each quarter for donations. When Davis volunteered to organize his first blood drive early this year, he discovered the blood drive program was in need of a kick-start.

"The program had fallen off track for whatever reason," said Davis. "When I called Victoria Fernette at ASBP, she gave us a modest initial goal simply because we hadn't had an especially successful blood drive in a while."

"I asked [Davis] to try for 30-40 units," said Victoria Fernette, public affairs specialist for the ASBP. "He ended up with more than 100 applicants. The results are proof that he believes in what he is doing."

The Aug. 6 blood drive that Davis organized attracted 115 donors. The next blood drive, scheduled for Oct. 12, promises to be the biggest yet, said Davis. His plan is to consistently grow the program, offering more blood to offset the ever-increasing human toll of more than a decade of combat.

All service members, dependants and retirees are eligible to donate. An hour of time and a pint of blood could save three lives.

"It is the donors that deserve credit for saving lives; I just made a few phone calls and set up chairs," said Davis. "Without the donors we cannot collect the blood needed to save our brothers and sisters in uniform."