Singer Rema Namakula and hubby Dr Hamza Ssebunya have been named Mengo Hospital's Rotary Blood brand ambassador. Hamza and Rema are going to be spear heading the hospital blood donation campaign.
The unveiling of the couple as the brand ambassador for Rotary Blood Bank happened on Wednesday at Kampala Serena hotel.
Rotary in partnership with the Mengo hospital have now launched a $100,000 (Shs 366 million) campaign to help in purchasing an ultra modern blood processing equipment.
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While addressing the press, Dr Frank Kakuba the head of the Rotary Blood Bank announced that they collect over 1000 units of blood every month but some of it goes to waste due to absence of the equipment that can screen and store blood.
“This blood can only be kept in fridges because the hospital doesn’t have the capacity to screen and keep this blood. We want to purchase the equipment so as to be able to screen and group the blood,” Kakuba said.
He also said that the equipment would be able to remove platelets from the blood that can be used to treat patients of sickle cells.
“We find ourselves giving out the blood platelets to the patients who don’t need them,” Kakuba added.
At the moment, Mengo Hospital relies on Nakasero Blood Bank to screen the blood it gets from donors and in most cases, this blood is wasted due to its short span.
