The New York Blood Center (NYBC) is organizing a blood drive on August 17 at Brooklyn’s Industry City, with the goal of using convalescent plasma to fight the rapid spread of COVID-19 across the country.
Convalescent plasma is the blood plasma of people who have recovered from COVID-19, which contains the antibodies that the donor’s body created to fight the disease. This can significantly aid in the recovery of recipients.
Although this type of treatment has been used in pandemics dating back a hundred years, NYBC was the first to create a public bank of COVID-19 convalescent plasma in March, through its work with Mount Sinai Health System of New York.
“We researched to see how patients can be treated with COVID-19”, says Javier Jimenez, an account manager at NYBC. “We saw that convalescent plasma helped with Ebola. We saw that for COVID-19, it helped patients recover a lot sooner.”
To date, NYBC has already supplied 40,000 units of blood plasma to hospitals across the country.
However, the pandemic has made it difficult to organize blood drives, because of the social distancing requirements in place.
“It is not easy trying to find a space that is sizeable,” says Jimenez. “With the COVID shut down, the number of blood drives has been greatly reduced.”
To ensure the health and safety of all participants on the August 17th blood drive, NYBC will enforce mandatory face coverings, wipe down all surfaces, and ensure that computers and all stations are spaced out sufficiently.
Participants will have their temperature taken before walking into the facility, and will be asked about their recent travel history. Refreshments will be provided but will be prepackaged in order to avoid contamination.
In order to participate in the blood drive, donors will need to have had no positive COVID-19 test within the past two weeks, and be symptom-free for 14 days. Although NYBC itself will not test for COVID-19, it will test the donated plasma for antibodies.
NYBC encourages those who have recovered from COVID-19 to consider donating. The blood drive is slated for 10 a.m. – 4 np.m., Monday, Aug. 17 at The Factory Floor at Industry City 233 37th Street in Sunset Park.
