The Sault’s Sam Milito has not only been a blood donor for the past few years, but he is also going to great lengths to raise awareness of the need for more local people to donate blood.
Sam, 65, a steel plant retiree, has volunteered tirelessly to get local eateries to provide refreshments to those who donate at Canadian Blood Services blood donor clinics.
Sam has successfully asked businesses such as Little Caesar’s, Aurora’s, Metro and others to provide food for blood donors (pizza from Little Caesar’s and Aurora’s, baked goods such as cookies from Metro), which he often collects and delivers himself to the donors at local blood donor clinics held by Canadian Blood Services.
“All they had before was crackers, which Canadian Blood Services provides, and juice (for donors after giving blood), but they never saw what I’m doing, and people are happy to see that. Before, people would donate blood and they looked like they were on an assembly line, no smiles on their faces…when you see that, it kind of turns you away.”
“Now they’ve got smiles, they talk, they can’t believe the stuff I bring in there,” said Sam, who is thankful to local businesses for the donated food.
And he does it all by himself.
“No one taught me anything, I just do it all myself. It’s a lot of running around, I go through a lot of gasoline,” Sam said with a chuckle, as he clearly enjoys this labour of love which he has performed for the past four years.
Thanks to Sam’s efforts, local donors will also receive a book of coupons from Canadian Blood Services at their next bimonthly blood donor clinic in May, in appreciation for giving blood.
The book will include coupons for discounts on meals from Northern Grand Gardens, Aurora’s, Bobbles Bistro and Domino’s Pizza, as well as discounts on services and products from Winexpert, The Medicine Shoppe Pharmacy, The Country Way, Steelton Shoe Store, Healthgear Medical Mart and Shoppers Home Health Care.
Sam said Northern Grand Gardens is also working on providing pasta, meatballs and chicken for the next blood donor clinic.
Sam has also drawn on the help of the Group Health Centre’s media office, which prints up posters and the coupon booklets for the cause, and several businesses and organizations in town have let Sam put up posters advertising the need for blood and details about Canadian Blood Services blood donor clinics.
The whole idea is not for self-promotion or to get people to eat, but to attract more people into donating blood, Sam said.
“There are a lot of middle-aged people donating blood, but I strongly hope we can recruit more young people to donate at the Canadian Blood Services Clinics,” Sam said.
The need to get more people to donate blood at the clinics is clear, Sam told SooToday.
“You can’t buy blood. You have to depend on people to donate it.”
“There’s a blood shortage, and if you look at the statistics, anyone who has leukemia needs about eight units of blood (up to eight donors a week),” Sam said.
“People have accidents and could need four or five units of blood, people need blood for operations…I want to get the word out.”
“If you have a rare blood type, sometimes it’s hard to get that blood if you need it and if people haven’t donated that type. They may try a few hospitals, but at the end if you need it badly and they don’t have it, chances are you might not make it,” Sam said.
Those receiving cancer treatments or having heart surgery will need up to five donors of blood, vehicle crash victims up to 50 donors, Canadian Blood Services states.
In addition:
- One in two Canadians can donate blood, but only one in 60 do
- One hour of a donor’s time can benefit the lives of three people in need of blood
- Half of all Canadians will either need blood or know someone who will need blood at some point in their lives
- 100,000 new donors are needed nationally
The next local, bimonthly Canadian Blood Services blood donor clinic will be held from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. May 21, 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. and 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. May 22 and 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. May 23, at The Bridge View Banquet Hall at 455 Queen Street West.
The next clinic will have the theme ‘In Honour of Megan.’
Megan Barban survived giving premature birth to her daughter Allyson (Ally) in July 2017 during a complicated six hour surgery at Mt. Sinai Hospital in Toronto.
Ally had some minor complications due to her premature birth, but doctors gave her a basically clean bill of health.
Had physicians not been prepared for the procedure, mother Megan’s rate of blood loss would have been one litre per minute.
Even with preparation, Megan lost over three litres of blood and needed several transfusions.
“If it wasn’t for the blood (she received, thanks to donors), she wouldn’t be here,” Sam said.
For a list of upcoming bimonthly blood donor clinics in Sault Ste. Marie, go to the Canadian Blood Services website