McNaughton: Blood donation worth a little pain
Committing service to provide blood rewarding
Wednesday, October 3rd, 2007
You experience a little pinch, and about 10 minutes later you get a cookie and a T-shirt. Doesn’t exactly sound too unreasonable, unless you’re me. I still dread going to the doctor for physicals, for the fear of enduring multiple ‘pinches’ in one afternoon. At the doctor, you don’t receive food and apparel for your bravery; instead you get a Garfield war wound bandage.
However, as apprehensive as I get due to the thought of needles, I, like many KU students, have my share of tattoos and piercings. After the blood drive on campus during the week of Sept. 24-28, I began reconsidering the voluntary pain I have spent my money and time on, in which the sole benefits go to me. For 10 minutes of my time, I could have donated a pint of blood and had the opportunity to save the lives of three people. I say could have, because I did not take advantage of the opportunity.
If you did take the initiative to help save lives, you may have noticed a difference in the eligibility requirements. Kansas, along with Washington, Georgia and a few other states, has lowered the minimum age of donation to 16, with parental consent. Some blood banks in Arizona are even allowing freshly tattooed persons the chance to donate, something that had previously deferred donors for a year.
Not only have regulation requirements eased up, but to appeal to younger audiences, some agencies are providing gifts post-donation. One of the new gifts is an iPod.
If you did make a trip to one of the on-campus locations set up by the KU Blood Drive Committee, Community Blood Center and the Red Cross, you would have walked away with your new T-shirt and a yummy cookie to compensate you for donating your blood. Granted it is not an elaborate ink design, or even an iPod; the satisfaction of helping should be enough. I am not trying to preach about how we all should have donated, because I did not even do it. Accordingly, only about 37 percent of the American population is eligible to donate.
If we have 15 minutes to spare and are willing to help other people, we should. Being students, it is not always easy to volunteer our time or donate our money to those who are less fortunate and in need. But if you would like to help, after learning more about it, I think donating blood is a great way to start. Even though Kansans will not receive iPods or more extravagant gifts, it should not be about that. Those of you who did help out by donating for the sake of donating, kudos to you, because I admire that. I, on the other hand, have set a goal for myself to overcome my wimpy ways and make a trip to the Community Blood Center to volunteer for free pain that benefits me in no way, other than making me feel good about myself and maybe making me a little light-headed.
McNaughton is a Topeka junior in journalism.
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