Armed Services Blood Program Blood Drive

Photo By Senior Airman Kiana Mitchell | A volunteer fills out the form that's needed to be able to donate blood, Jun. 1, 2020, Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany. Even during a pandemic, the Spangdahlem Community filled all available slots. (U.S. Air Force photo by SrA Kiana Mitchell)  

SPANGDAHLEM, RP, GERMANY

12.15.2020

Story by Senior Airman Kiana Mitchell 

AFN Spangdahlem

The Armed Services Blood Program, or ASBP, is a DOD program whose blood goes out to service members including down range and Special Forces troops as well as military hospitals around the world. Here at Spangdahlem Air Base, the ASBP comes out to the Community Center every 8 weeks to collect blood from those who choose to volunteer.
“We’ve been really lucky, we’ve got a relationship with the Community Center, and the Brickhouse staff” says Stacy Sanning, the Blood Donor Recruiter for the Armed Services Blood Program Europe. “They have always made sure that we’ve got the availability to come in and hold these blood drives here. There’s plenty of space, even right now during COVID to keep people at least six feet apart.”
When the ASBP visited Spangdahlem Air Base on June 1st, 2020, the first blood donations that required extra steps due to the coronavirus outbreak were given. When volunteers arrived their temperature was taken, hand sanitizer was offered, and everything that the donors touched got wiped down afterwards. The most difficult part according to Sanning, was that the number of people they could take each day had significantly dropped.
“Normally we can take up to a hundred a day, but now it caps out to about forty eight. We’ve been lucky though because the Spangdahlem Community showed up and filled every single one of those forty eight appointments.”
Restrictions on who is eligible to donate blood are also improving. The FDA has updated their eligibility guidelines and the ASBP is working to implement those guidelines as quickly and safely as possible.
“We’re hoping that by the next time we come back to Spangdahlem, those restrictions on people who have been overseas for more than five years will be going away completely. Some of the other restrictions like having to wait one year after an overseas tattoo or one year after visiting a malaria risk country, [are] going to go down from one year to only a 3 month wait” says Sanning.
Less restrictions open up the possibility for even more people to donate blood and keep the military blood supply at maximum capacity.
To find out if you are eligible to donate, or for more information, call DSN 590-5885 or 06371-9464-5885.

• Date Taken: 12.15.2020
• Date Posted: 12.15.2020 10:06
• Story ID: 384998
• Location: SPANGDAHLEM, RP, DE