Jammu, June 13 (KNS): Lieutenant Governor, Girish Chandra Murmu, in his message on World Blood Donor Day, has underlined the importance of raising awareness about regular blood donations and valuable contribution donors are making to the entire community as a critical factor in improving health and for achieving the goal of universal health coverage.

This year’s theme “Safe blood saves lives” with the slogan “Give blood and make the world a healthier place”, aptly reflects the need to promote blood donation as a virtue, he said.

The idea of this year’s campaign of World Health Organization is to focus on the contribution an individual giver can make to improve health for others in the community.

The Lt Governor observed that regular blood donations provide access to affordable and timely supplies of safe and quality-assured blood to all individuals and communities, in both normal and emergency situations.“I would like to take this event as opportunity to thank voluntary, unpaid blood donors for their life-saving gifts of blood”, he added.

The Lt Governor also highlighted the need for maintaining adequate supplies and timely access to safe blood transfusion, besides demonstrating the need for its universal access. He appealed to every healthy adult to voluntarily donate blood, on a regular basis and become life-savers. (KNS)