Hurricane Idalia Led to a Nationwide Blood Shortage

Tuesday, September 19th, 2023 -- 4:00 PM

(Bob Hague, WRN) Severe weather has again led to a nationwide blood shortage.

Jennifer Warren is with the American Red Cross of Wisconsin. "Each day, the Red Cross needs to collect about 12,500 blood donations to meet the needs of patients at about 2500 hospitals and transfusion centers across the country."

But Hurricane Idalia led to a shortfall of some 30,000 donations last month. “Coming out of that, that's a big part of the reason why we're in the national blood shortage.”

Warren says that’s due in part to Hurricane Idalia last month. “It led to widespread power outages, travel hazards and flooding. And it caused the cancellation of over a dozen blood drives. And it caused hundreds of blood and platelet donations to go uncollected. And so the compounded shortfall left us with about 30,000 less donations in August.”

You can make an appointment to donate at redcrossblood.org.

Feel free to contact us with questions and/or comments.