Minister wants introduction of ‘Health Calendar’

Nadira Gunatilleke

The country needs to introduce a ‘Health Calendar’ because the health sector celebrates a large number of `days’ during the year, Health Minister Maithripala Sirisena said.

The Ministers said that the Blood Transfusion Service of Sri Lanka will receive a separate calendar and the whole country will be given opportunities to donate blood.

The first day of this calendar will be allocated for Parliamentarians and their staff (which is over 3,000) to donate blood on this day.

Minister Sirisena pointed out that the second day of the calendar will be allocated for the staff of Presidential Secretariat and the rest of the days of the year will be allocated to all the other State Ministries, Departments and institutions.

The main objective of this program is obtaining the contribution of all citizens towards the country’s blood transfusion service.

At the moment the total annual blood requirement of Sri Lanka is 315,000 units of blood and the number of blood donors exceed 300,000.

Around 99 percent of Sri Lankan blood donors are volunteers who do not expect cash or any other benefit in return. Sri Lanka has the best blood transfusion service in the South East Asia, the Minister added.