With communities from North Carolina to New England suffering from significant flooding, wind damage and widespread power outages from Hurricane Irene, the American Red Cross is responding with shelter, food and other assistance.  Saturday night, the Red Cross was operating in more than 500 shelters, providing shelter for more than 27,000 people, and still had 300 shelters open for 8,000 people Sunday night. Since Friday, the Red Cross has provided more than 48,000 overnight shelter stays.  The Red Cross has also arranged to procure approximately 1.3 million meals through various vendors in North Carolina, Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey and New York. 

In addition to the need for financial donations to the Red Cross for the disaster operation, which will likely cost in the millions, the Red Cross is in need of another kind of donation as well: blood donations are needed now.  The Red Cross is urging immediate blood and platelet donations in areas unaffected by this storm.  I hope that you will consider helping in this effort utilizing the attached press release to spread the word of the need for blood.

Nationwide, around 44,000 blood donations are needed each and every day to meet the needs of accident victims, cancer patients and child with blood disorders.  These patients and others rely on blood products during their treatment, and the need does not diminish when disaster strikes – even though blood donors may find it difficult or impossible to get to a convenient donation opportunity.  Since Hurricane Irene began its path along the East Coast, the storm has forced the cancellation of over 60 American Red Cross blood drives, resulting in the shortfall of more than 2,100 pints of blood.  It is expected that additional blood drives will be postponed in the coming days due to storm damage and power outages.  While thousands of donors responded to a Red Cross appeal for blood in July, and the inventory has stabilized somewhat, the need still remains. And, this storm has impacted our ability to build the blood inventory back up to sufficient levels.

The storm may be over, but our work is far from done. 

If you have additional questions or would like to schedule an interview, please don’t hesitate to contact me.  As always, thanks for your support.