Your digest

How we are growing domestic plasma supply for Canadian patients:

With the support of funding from provincial and territorial governments, plans are now underway for Canadian Blood Services to increase plasma collection in more cities across Canada. New plasma donor centres will open in Brampton and Ottawa, Ontario by spring 2022, and plans are underway for a centre in Winnipeg, Manitoba opening in fall of 2022. These three centres will open as new locations in each city; whole blood donor centres will remain open and operational in the same cities.

“Collecting plasma is not a new business for Canadian Blood Services” says our CEO, Dr. Graham Sher. “We have collected plasma at some of our existing blood donor centres for many years and we also recover a small amount of plasma from every whole blood donation. While we’ve been able to increase plasma collection within our current network, and at the new centres in Sudbury, Lethbridge and Kelowna, more needs to be done. Adding another three dedicated plasma donor centres represents the next phase in increasing plasma sufficiency in Canada.” Learn more on Connect.

Thank you for participating in Green Shirt Day: Thank you to everyone who helped us honour Logan Boulet’s legacy by wearing green and spreading awareness about organ and tissue donation during this year’s Green Shirt Day. Here, at Canadian Blood Services, we are celebrating and sharing the undeniable power of organ tissue donation and transplantation all April long. Help us keep the momentum in honour of National Organ and Tissue Donation Awareness Week (April 18 – 25), by downloading our OTDT toolkit full of downloadable graphics to use on your social media accounts, registering for our lunch and learn on April 21 at 12:00 p.m. ET, and sharing inspiring stories coming your way all month long on Connect, blood.ca/stories and via Your Digest.

Take advantage of virtual Goodlife fitness classes: We know how challenging it is to remain active right now. With strict physical distancing guidelines in place in many regions across the country, many gyms and recreational facilities have temporarily closed. Physical fitness is so important for both our bodies and our mental wellbeing. To help, we will be continuing to offer free virtual fitness classes every week! Yoga, Core Balance and Sh’BAM virtual classes taught by seasoned Goodlife instructors are open to all employees and members of their household. Can’t make it live? Weekly classes are available for 24 hours after each live session. To learn more about our class schedule and how to register, visit Connect.

Question of the day: I am a frontline employee, and I curious why I am seeing some of my colleagues who are able to work remotely receiving the COVID-19 vaccine before me. Shouldn’t frontline healthcare workers be receiving prioritized access?

Although we have confirmed prioritized access to the vaccine for our onsite frontline operational teams in most jurisdictions, we are seeing some public health authorities prioritize vaccine appointments based on other eligibility requirements — predominantly age and underlying health conditions.

The government-led vaccination roll-out across the country varies greatly among provinces and from one local public health authority to the next. We know that inevitably, some employees will receive quicker access to the vaccine dependent on where they live, their age and their individual health considerations.

Although the varying approaches to eligibility and sequencing are out of our control, we are assessing the available information daily, and updating the vaccine page on the COVID-19 portal so you can learn of opportunities to book a vaccine appointment.

We also working directly with local jurisdictions who have identified that they will be coordinating regional access to the vaccine for Canadian Blood Services onsite operational employees. In these circumstances, Canadian Blood Services may be contacted by public health to provide information directly regarding our eligible employees and volunteers for group registration. We are making every effort to assist, including contacting affected teams and/or individuals directly or through their manager to secure consent to share information such as their name, contact information and any other information which may be requested by the local public health

We encourage all employees and volunteers to take advantage of the opportunity to be vaccinated in their community outside of Canadian Blood Services’ efforts. Please double-check that you meet the criteria for vaccination in your specific region according to age and individual health considerations. To learn more visit www.blood.ca/employees/vaccines

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About your digest

This digest will highlight the latest policy and employee support measures, resources to help you manage our new reality and original content like articles and videos to remind us that what we do matters.  No access to email? No problem — all this information and more can be found on blood.ca/employees from any device, no login required.    

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