Your Digest

Cord blood banking resumes next week 

Canadian Blood Services is excited to share that we will resume cord blood banking on Oct. 17, 2022, following a temporary suspension due to a global shortage of cord blood processing kits. The kits, essential to our national public cord blood bank, are used to separate and process the stem cells in cord blood units before storage. During the suspension, we continued to collect umbilical cord blood for our quality assurance activities such as training, validation and product/process improvement, and for our Cord Blood for Research program. Now, the availability of kits allows us to resume collecting cord blood stem cells for transplant. Read more on blood.ca.  

Online registration for flu shot clinics now open  

Annual flu shots are the most effective way to help prevent the spread of the flu virus, and another way you can help save lives. To help make getting vaccinated as easy and convenient as possible, we offer free flu shot clinics at some of our centres across the country. Protect yourself and others by registering for an appointment at one of our free flu shot clinics. 

Our CEO shares commitments to Indigenization 

In the Snapshots section of Connect, you’ll find a new blog post where Graham reflects on the second annual National Day for Truth and Reconciliation and the recent public launch of our Reconciliation Action Plan. He also shares his own commitments to the vital Indigenization and reconciliation work that Canadian Blood Services is engaged in. His blog calls on employees (if they haven’t already) to consider how they can play a role in advancing reconciliation with Indigenous peoples and communities.   

Blood type compatibility: Which blood types are compatible with each other? 

Have you heard the term “universal donor” or heard us make a public call for O-negative donors? In a new article on blood.ca, we explore why it's important to know your blood type and which blood types are compatible or incompatible with one another. Find out some of the benefits of blood type compatibility and how that knowledge could help in an emergency situation.  

Question of the day

How is Canadian Blood Services advocating for more inclusive eligibility criteria (even for those who donate at Grifols’ centres)? 

Canadian Blood Services continues to evolve our donor eligibility criteria to ensure they are as equitable and as inclusive as possible. We are actively working with individuals and communities affected by past and current criteria to further understand the depths of harm and stigma they have experienced. We are committed to continued learning and engagement with these communities, and to reviewing and contributing to the scientific data available so that we can reduce barriers to donation while maintaining the safety of Canada’s blood and plasma supplies. 

While we have entered into an agreement with Grifols to work collaboratively to improve plasma sufficiency for immunoglobulins in Canada, we will still operate independently. Both Canadian Blood Services and Grifols are accountable to Health Canada, as regulator of blood and blood products in this country. However, Grifols is an international organization and, therefore, accountable to various regulatory bodies worldwide. This means they have their own criteria for screening donors that is approved for use in multiple countries, which may not fully align with ours.