With donor help the Philippines and Viet Nam have begun strengthening and coordinating blood transfusion services.
Approximately 21 million units of blood are collected every year in the Region, a figure steadily increasing as countries such as China are targeting more voluntary non-remunerated blood donations.
Nationally coordinated blood transfusion services (BTS) . The BTS requires government commitment and support with an adequate budget , management team and trained staff. Australia, Cambodia, China, Fiji, Japan, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Malaysia, Mongolia, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Palau, the Philippines, the Republic of Korea, Samoa, Singapore, Solomon Islands, and Vanuatu already have national blood policies. Brunei Darussalam, and Viet Nam have developed national blood policies and plans to implement them.
Voluntary non-remunerated donations vary from 40-100% in different countries. Collection only from voluntary non-remunerated blood donors in low-risk populations is recognized as an important element for the safety, quality, availability and accessibility of blood transfusions. Many countries now celebrate World Blood Donor Day
The rational use of blood by clinicians is recognized as a critical issue. However, most of the blood is utilized as whole blood due to a lack of awareness in clinicians and inadequate blood component production facilities.
Quality of screening for major infections such as HIV and hepatitis B & C is a critical issue in the WPR where number of people living with HIV is estimated to be 1.3 million. Figures for hepatitis B and hepatitis C are available in Western Pacific CHiPS.
Training workshops to combat this have been conducted in Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, China, Fiji, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Macao (China), Malaysia, Mongolia, the Philippines and Viet Nam.
WHO Initiative on Quality Management - More than 150 quality managers have been trained under this initiative and ongoing technical support is provided from WHO collaborating centres.
Viet Nam received continued support from WHO ; capacity-building in quality management ; developing a sustainable model of financing and auditing for a centralized blood services; technical specifications for a national information technology management system.; introduction of electronic data collection at key regional blood centers.
WHO provided support to Lao PDR, Fiji, Solomon Islands, the Philippines in successfully obtaining a grant from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM) to improve blood safety and availability.