The Youth Ministry of the Church of Pentecost, Aflao District, has donated 35 pints of blood to shore up the blood stock at the Ketu South Municipal Hospital.

The donation exercise held at the Shekinah Assembly, Aflao, was the first of its kind by the Church in the Ketu South Municipality.

Elder Murphy Kwame Kudiabor, District Youth Leader, who spoke to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) on the sidelines of the exercise, said their gesture was a response to the call to help restock blood at the Municipal Hospital, which formed part of the Church’s Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

“We decided to respond to the Hospital’s call for support because as a Church, we have the responsibility to help save lives of people and one way to do that is through blood donation. Besides, it also falls in line with the Church’s vision 2023 agenda of influencing societal values through the kingdom’s principles and values.”

Elder Kudiabor underscored the need for people to willingly donate to stock blood banks in hospitals saying, “you may never know when you’ll need blood and so, donating blood is a way of saving your own life or that of your family.”

Rev Michael Awuni, District Pastor, Church of Pentecost, Aflao, encouraged Christians to learn to give blood to save lives.

“Life saving is a good thing. As long as you can donate blood, do it to save lives. We shouldn’t withhold what is good from people.”

Radolf Edem Gaglo, Blood Donation Organiser at Ketu South Municipal Hospital, said getting people to voluntarily donate blood had remained one major challenge in the Municipality, noting, they were expecting to collect about 70 pints of blood on the day.

He said though stock at the blood bank was being well managed, it was still not enough explaining, a hospital needed to have enough blood in stock to avoid blood-related deaths.

“I encourage everyone fit to donate blood to willingly do so, as no blood is less needed. Because of the misgivings Ketu South residents have about donating blood resulting in low community blood donation, we are forced to rely on family replacement to manage the blood stock to be in position to serve the high numbers who visit the hospital in need of blood almost on daily basis.”