Over 16,000 Units of Blood Ready for Hajj Pilgrims: Health Ministry

Riyadh, MINA – More than 16,000 units of blood and blood products are available to treat Hajj pilgrims in the holy cities, Arab News reported.

The Saudi Ministry of Health (MoH) elaborated a four-step action plan with relevance to provision of blood and blood products, starting from the point of collection of blood donations, proceeding through testing and monitoring of each unit, until the distribution of the collected units in the holy cities.

The MoH underlined that the units of blood are free from infectious diseases, and that the relevant distribution plan for Makkah and Madinah has been created in accordance with international standards and the bed capacity of hospitals and intensive care units, in addition to past experiences.

Nine hospitals in Makkah, four in Arafat, and four in Mina have been equipped with state-of-the-art equipment, having recruited highly skilled technicians and experts in the fields of laboratories and blood banks, IINA reported.

Seventeen regions and governorates, and 27 partners from the public, private, and military sectors have exerted efforts to collect the 16,000 units of blood.

Two cars and five teams have been deployed to facilitate the blood donation process, in addition to ambulances, equipped with blood-transfusion equipment, which can respond to emergency cases.(T/R04/RS5)

Mi’raj News Agency (MINA)