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The gift of blood and some international aspects of blood transfusion

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 January 2010

Z. S. Hantchef
Z. S. Hantchef*
Affiliation:
Director of the Medico-Social Bureau of the League of Red Cross Societies
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Extract

Mention of blood transfusion is to be found from the very beginning of medicine. In fact, tradition has it that Aesculapius used venous blood for therapeutic ends. Pythagoras, and later Ovid, tell of the miraculous results obtained from the practice of transfusion. There is the widely known primitive custom, still practised in Europe less than five centuries ago, which consisted of drinking the blood of one's adversary in order to acquire his virtues.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review of the Red Cross (1961 - 1997) , Volume 1 , Issue 7 , October 1961 , pp. 355 - 370
Copyright
Copyright © International Committee of the Red Cross 1961

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References

page 356 note 1 The rô1e of blood transfusion centres in the event of a national or international disaster—appeal, warning, information and press, collection and despatch of blood, national and international co-ordination—was recently dealt with in the Revue “Transfusion” (Vol. IV, No. 1, 1960) by Dr. J. P. Soulier, Director of the National Blood Transfusion Centre in Paris.

page 356 note 2 This particular question has been the subject of an article by ProfessorMoureau, Paul, which appeared in Les Annales du Droit International Médical (Monaco, 12 1958)Google Scholar under the title “The Problem of Blood on the International Level”.

page 360 note 1 It should be mentioned in this respect that in 1960 a test on the “motivation” of the blood donor was undertaken by Dr. George Miller, National Director of the Blood Transfusion Service of the Canadian Red Cross. These are the results taken from a thousand replies from donors coming from different social levels of the population: 72% indicate as a motive the desire to help an unknown person; 56% became donors thanks to personal contacts; 98% feel better after giving blood and 99% intend to continue being donors.

page 360 note 2 Dr. Louis Revol, director of the Lyons Transfusion Centre (Extract from Notre Sang, quarterly review of the National Blood Service of the Belgian Red Cross, No. 25, 1961).

page 362 note 1 Mention should also be made of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) one of whose numerous technical committees studies the standards of transfusion equipment. Finally, it should be remembered that the member States of the Council of Europe have established an agreement aiming at the international exchange of therapeutic substances of human origin.

page 365 note 1 Plate. (Photographs kindly lent by the League).