Canadian Blood Services needs over 1,200 donor appointments to be filled in Manitoba by the end of the week and are looking to get 70 of those in Steinbach.

Manitoba Spokesperson Darrin Desmedt says they do generally see a dip in donations during the holidays but the whole month of December has been abnormally tough on Canadian Blood Services.

“We take a hit to certain days where we had to cancel clinics because of weather, or even right now through the holidays where people are out with friends and family or they are traveling and blood donations are not top of mind, so that is where we see that potentially we are not filling the clinics and there is potential to draw down on the inventory.”

Desmedt says the loss of Boxing Day clinics led to a drop of 20% of the donations they needed in the week following Christmas. He says they are also looking for more donation appointments to be filled in Steinbach on January 2nd.

“To get a little bit more granular from a Steinbach perspective. We have a clinic on January second and you know we are 60% booked, really we need about 70 appointments to get that clinic up to capacity so that just shows you how granular we can get with these mobiles to ensure we hit our donation goal.”

Desmedt says on average Canadian Blood Services needs to collect approximately 1,000 units of blood every week to keep up with patient demands and those demands do not go down in the holiday season.

“Our patients keep using blood at the same rate as they do at any other time of year so that is why it is important if people have time we really would urge them to take a little time out of their holiday schedule, come out, donate and it is truly the gift that can't be bought.”

Desmedt says on a more positive note the Steinbach blood donor clinics collected over 2,000 units of blood in 2016 which is something to celebrate.