Australians with a common genetic condition are being urged to consider donating, rather than discarding the blood they routinely give.
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00:00So actually it's about 1 in 160 Australians are affected, and it usually affects people
00:07who have Northern European heritage.
00:10So it's a genetic disorder, we're born with it, but it takes time for the body to absorb
00:14iron gradually over a lifetime.
00:16So it's usually the diseases expressed in people who are aged 40 and over.
00:21This is one of very few conditions that you can treat very effectively simply by giving
00:25blood.
00:26So the excess iron is taken out of the body by blood donation, or by giving blood.
00:31And so this is an amazing opportunity to use that blood for other people who require blood
00:35transfusions.
00:37Some people with haemochromatosis don't know that their blood can be used for donation
00:41purposes.
00:42So only about 60% of people who were surveyed recently by Lifeblood realised that they could
00:47use their blood for donation, and so awareness is a big part of this.
00:51In Australia we've been using haemochromatosis blood donations for blood transfusion for
00:56many years, but they've changed the guidelines now, these people can also donate plasma.
01:01So it's about awareness for people with this disease.
01:03It's a great opportunity because people with this disease are regular donors.
01:08They are 2.5% of the donating population in Australia.
01:11So if we can get them to donate at centres where the blood can be used for transfusion,
01:16and then also let them know in between their usual donations they can be donating plasma,
01:21that's really a change.
01:23We always have an undersupply, and certainly with rarer blood types we can get critical
01:29shortages in Australia.
01:31So we want to go from 60% of these patients to 100% donating their blood where we can
01:38use it and not discard it.