There is an immediate and urgent need for rh negative blood by a much-loved and very well-known member of the expat community here in Taiwan. This is a rare blood type, especially among Asians. (16 percent of whites have it, but less than 1% of blacks and Asians do).
If you have this kind of blood, please contact Jason at 0930-522-437 or Matt at 0956-673-717 NOW. This can’t wait.
Mod note: title edited from “rh negative” to “B negative” based on comments further below in the thread. --DB
Just an update on this. For today supplies are sufficient but if anyone is rh B negative please contact the numbers above. And please pray for our friend.
This just in from Eiger John: [quote]According to the hospital and the blood banks, there is enough blood now. Also note that there are some weird xenophobic rules in effect in which they turn away a lot of British and European donors. But that said, thanks to everybody who came out to help to be a donor!!! Bless all of you. Please keep Kevin in your hopes and prayers.[/quote]
A few years ago I tried to donate blood in one of these buses. In the form they ask, whether you lived in Europe between ?? and ??. If you check this with yes, than they can not use your blood. They told me it is because of still existing uncertainities regarding Mad-cow-disease and its relation to Creutzfeldt-Jacob. They also will not use the blood of Taiwanese who lived in Europe for this certain time. So nothing xenophobic, just a little bit overcautious I think.
The anti-British donor rules are found in many places around the world: it’s because of the fear of transmission of CJD (mad cow disease) to the recipient (though I’d imagine in a desperate situation that CJD would be the least of one’s worries).
Xenophobic–I think not. :no-no: Nope, I call it trying to adhere to high safety standards. Taiwan fails in this area on a number of fronts, but thank hell they don’t with blood.
If I remember correctly they don’t accept blood donations from people who resided in the UK for long periods of time pre-1995 (more than 1 year) because of potential exposure to Mad Cow Disease. Makes a hell of a lot of sense to me because the e-tracking systems for cattle were not in place prior to that.
For a more centralized resource on Kevin’s condition, we have set up a Facebook Group: Kevin Skelly Support Group. I’ll still update here, but that is the central resource right now. If you want to join and I don’t add you right away, be patient - someone else will - there are several admin in that group.
Thanks everyone, for all the concern. It’s appreciated more than you know!
The same problem came up before, in the mid-1990’s (or so I heard). Apparently a British teacher died because of being O-negative and not having compatible blood in the bank. Maybe it would be possible to set up some kind of registration system for people with rare blood types, who are willing to give blood on short notice for the sake of such emergencies (rather than milking them every three months for blood that will probably never be used).
That’s a good idea. The problem in this case is that Kevin is a blood type very rare amongst Taiwanese. I don’t even know my blood type so I wasted 3 hours yesterday at a hospital just to find out if I was compatible (I wasn’t).
:no-no: Nope, I call it trying to adhere to high safety standards. Taiwan fails in this area on a number of fronts, but thank hell they don’t with blood.