Something quite interesting happened to me today, and I have been digging into it. I think a *BIG* story might yet come out of this one.

Some weeks ago, I put out stories about the furore caused by some moron over the fact that “White blood” was regarded as safer than “Black blood”. Immediately… the Government, indeed the Minister of Health no less… seized upon this “racism” and swore to immediately put a stop to it.

Of course… this classification of blood is merely the result of statistics which have shown for years that AIDS is much more prevalent among blacks than whites and therefore… it was quite simple and logical to take “ethnicity” into account when deciding which blood was likely to be safer.

I said back then, that I am willing to bet that the “non-racist” approach will be: (a) More costly (b) Less effective, and that the upshot is likely to be an increase in the transmission of HIV via blood transfusions.

Today something interesting happened to me… which might indicate that something even bigger… and much more devastating might come of this…

The last news reports I heard said that the Government had been discussing the matter with the South African Blood Service and they have come up with a “new model” which was non-racist and which would ensure a safe blood supply.

Today, I might have had my first glimpse at this “new non-racist” model.

I went off to donate blood this morning… as I am a regular blood donor. I normally donate blood on saturday mornings, so this morning was a bit out of the ordinary. When I got there, at 9:40am I noticed that nobody was donating blood. That struck me as strange because normally on a saturday morning at least 3 or more people would already be lying on the beds. But today was friday… so I thought: Maybe it is just quieter in the week?

I went and filled out the laborious 2 page questionnaire which included questions about my medical history and also questions about sexual behaviour.

Sadly, in recent years, the blood service has been changing their staff a lot at the branch where I donate. All the whites are gone, and I’ve seen a number of non-white staff come and go. So unfortunately, I don’t know the staff there – like I used to. I was on very good terms with the nursing sisters and staff there in the past.

I noticed an Indian nursing sister and a black woman at the computer. I had never seen either of these two before.

So I handed in my form, and was waiting for the Indian woman to prick my finger to test my iron levels. They also have, as part of their procedure, a short question and answer session – an “Interview” as they call it. Normally, they just casually fire 3 questions at you along the lines of: “Do you consider your blood to be safe for transfusion to patients… and did you answer the questions correctly/honestly…” Its normally quite amiable and one hardly notices it.

But today, I noticed a change. The Indian nursing sister was very pushy and remanded me on not filling in all my details, including my address, etc in full. I told her that in the past, during my 16 years of donating blood, that the staff were friendly and had said I did not need to fill in all those questions each time since it was on the computer. So she said to me that the rules had now changed. Ok… cool…

Then she fired off a bunch of questions at me which caught me completely off guard and totally floored me.

It began like this:-
“Are you single?”
“Yes”
“Do you have a regular sex partner?”
I answered…
She asked some other question about my personal sex life…
I answered…
“Have you changed your sex partner recently?”
“What has this got to do with you?”
Then she looked at me and said: “If you fail to answer the interview questions, you cannot donate blood!”

I looked at this cheeky, pushy woman, and in an instant RAGE, I slammed both my hands down on the table with such a force and noise that both of the women jumped in fright… and I said to her calmly: “You have now lost a blood donor!”… and I walked right out the door.

Let me return to the question-and-answer session. I was absolutely floored at the personal, intimate questions asked about my sex life. Not only that, but this is not done privately. You are sitting in an open room, and everyone present can hear her questions and my answers. If other donors had been lying there… they would have heard these highly personal and intimate questions and answers! Never in my life, have I even had my own doctor ask me such deeply personal questions.

Later in the day, still seething with rage, I thought about this, and thought: But hold on… I’m pretty sure that hardly any of the other donors will put up with this… and could this be why nobody was donating blood this morning?

Let me digress and paint a picture for you which is 100% real about blood donations in South Africa. I remember from past discussions with nursing sisters in the blood transfusion service, that there are approximately 250,000 regular blood donors in South Africa, who service 44 million people. In South Africa you don’t get paid for your blood. Blood donors here do it for free – and there is this small cadre of people who pride themselves on carrying out this “civic duty”. Nobody forces them. They are self-motivated and do this with amazing regularity. In any other country, they would be regarded as model citizens.

Furthermore, I have donated blood for at least about 16 years – regularly. My sister has donated for about 20 years non-stop and a good friend of mine for 35 years – non-stop. In fact, he has donated about 200 pints of blood – which puts him in a very small group of people.

Even though many non-whites have moved into our suburbs over the years, I have only once seen a black man donate blood and only once seen a coloured man donate blood. All the other times I have seen only whites donating blood. My sister tells the same story. In the town where she lives, she says she has NEVER seen a non-white person donating blood.

Judging by the comments I have heard from nursing sisters in the past, about the problems they had with donations by blacks and by my own observations when donating blood – I would guess – that at least 90% of the blood donated in South Africa – comes from WHITES!! My nephew tells me he’s heard blacks saying that they refuse to donate blood unless they are paid for it. In South Africa you don’t get paid to donate blood – period. I am quite convinced that the vast mass of blood in this country comes almost exclusively from whites – yet, most of those receiving it, must be blacks (since they make up the majority of the population).

My mother mentioned to some friends of hers my experience. Her friends, an old couple, turned around and told her, that they were also asked these invasive sexual questions and they immediately stopped donating blood. They said they would not put up with this invasion of their lives since they were carrying out a free service and did not have to put up with this kind of attitude.

Unfortunately, my sister has not donated blood recently, and my friend with 200 donations is on “strike” – because he is busy having an argument with the blood service about his 200 donations… So I can’t confirm whether this procedure is indeed being carried out everywhere with the ruthlessness which I experienced it. Though… the story of the old couple seems to confirm that this is indeed happening elsewhere.

I will take a peek tomorrow (saturday), to see if they are as busy as they used to be on saturdays… or not…

Here is what I suspect: It seems to me, this most intrusive interview process may be the result of the new “non-racist model” the moronic Minister of Health was crowing about. If so… I wonder how many White donors have been completely alienated by this ridiculous process… Furthermore, as my sister also says: Do these stupid questions, asked verbally, prove anything? Does it make blood any safer? How do you know the respondent isn’t lying? I could have lied if I wanted to… and they would not have known any better…

But I am wondering… if this new procedure is perhaps driving away… thousands of the “core donors?”

Due to AIDs, etc… South Africa is constantly on the edge… and experiencing blood shortages. At times like now, with Easter coming up, and many people going on holiday… there are lots of accidents and they are constantly calling upon citizens to donate blood. I am wondering… if we won’t see a most unprecedented shortage of blood… on a scale never before seen in this country?

I will dig around… I have asked those I know… to ask around and to let me know.

One friend of mine knows someone high up in the blood service and said he will pass my story on to her.

I am seething with anger. I already want to write to the blood service to tell them the following:-

“You people are BEGGARS. We don’t get paid for this. We do this at our own cost and inconvenience. If your staff are going to cop an attitude then I want to say to you: STUFF YOU!! You’ve lost a donor… and I hope you lose many thousands more!!”

This also set me thinking about why I’m donating. Chances are… that 70-90% of the blood I’m donating is saving the life of some black person… and I’m asking myself: Do I really want to be responsible for saving their lives? Maybe… I don’t want to…?

And this brings me back to the “racist blood” furore… I hope that with their cheek and arrogance, at refusing to recognise a selfless contribution by White people… that lots and lots of whites stop donating blood. (Wouldn’t it be cool if someone could organise a “racist campaign” to ask whites not to donate blood any more?)… Thousands of people (the vast majority being black), would DIE! And I’d love to see them scrambling around… among a black population that is infected up to its eyeballs in HIV… trying to find blood which can be used. You may find that they will need to get 5 or 6 times as much blood… than before, since most of it will be unusable. It would totally decimate the blood service… But you know what… it would serve them right!

I would love to see them forking out money, buying blood from outside Africa… trying to make up for what they got for FREE previously!!

I’m going to watch this development… because this might just be a huge disaster that was created by arrogant blacks who cannot accept the realities of life and work accordingly. Thanks to the mean-spirited manner in which they seek out any inane thing which can be used as an “example of racism”… I hope they suffer accordingly.

As for me – I will make a point of never donating another pint of blood again.

Finally, I must mention this important point: Many of you have read or heard President Mbeki’s completely moronic statements in the international media (which had the Wall Street Journal actually questioning his SANITY!)… wherein he said that HIV and AIDS are not related… He goes on about the link to poverty (as opposed to SEX), etc, etc… trying to blame AIDS on whites, etc…

Well, the SANBS (SA National Blood Service), obviously does not prescribe to the Crazy President’s theory… because the standard questionaire has always asked questions about your sexual behaviour… and the “new model” as I have mentioned is totally invasive… and focusses on SEX, SEX and more SEX!!!!

Now if the Crazy President’s insane propaganda had any practical value… then maybe the sex questions should be dropped and replaced with questions like this: “What is your annual income?”… because then, if you are poor… we’d know you are most likely to be HIV(43)+!!! … Are you “previously disadvantaged?”…

The joke is… if you asked such questions… Whites would still come out as being the ones with the safest blood!!!

Let me stop… I am engulfed by the madness of it all… Is this a crazy country or what?

Jan