PURPOSE: Every year on 14 June, countries around the world celebrate World Blood Donor Day. Blood donations are a lifeline in emergencies, disasters, humanitarian crises, and for people who need regular transfusions. And yet around the world, many communities do not have access to safe blood. Women and children are the most at risk. The event serves to raise awareness of the need for safe blood and blood products and to thank voluntary, unpaid blood donors for their life-saving gifts of blood. Donating blood at a nearby Blood Center is a safe, simple, and satisfying experience. Your donation helps give life to the millions of patients each year who require blood transfusions during surgery, after an accident, or because they have a disease that requires blood components. There are many different ways to donate lifesaving blood products, including whole blood, platelet, plasma, and automated red cell donation.The process for whole blood and automated red cell donations usually takes about 45-60 minutes. Donating platelets can take a bit longer (approximately 2 hours).
FORUM: “Give blood, give hope: together we save lives.” World Blood Donor Day 2025. This year’s campaign slogan highlights the life-changing impact blood donors have on those in need. It celebrates the power of community and solidarity in saving lives through the simple act of giving blood. The campaign seeks to inspire by sharing real stories of people whose lives were saved thanks to blood donation or personal experiences from donors themselves, encouraging regular donors to keep giving, and motivating healthy individuals, especially young adults, to become first-time donors. The objectives of the World Blood Donor Day 2025 campaign are to:
Raise public awareness about the critical need for blood and plasma donations and the impact they have on patients' lives.
Encourage both new and existing donors to give blood regularly, helping to ensure a stable and sufficient blood supply.
Highlight the positive impact of blood donors on the health and well-being of others and promote the values of solidarity, compassion, and community through blood donation.
Mobilize support from governments and development partners to invest in and sustain national blood programs to achieve universal access to safe blood transfusion worldwide.
Follow the conversations with the hashtags: #bloodonors Transfusions, #GiveBloodGiveHope, #GiveBlood, #GivePlasma, #blooddonors, #14june, #WorldBloodDonorDay, #BloodDonations.
EVENTS: On June 14th, 2025, the WHO, its partners and communities across the world will unite behind the theme to mark the World Blood Donor Day 2025. Activities may include commemorative events, meetings and workshops, donor appreciation ceremonies, social networking campaigns, special media broadcasts, musical and artistic events to thank blood donors, the publication of impactful stories and other activities that help to promote the theme of this year’s World Blood Donor Day. The goals of the event is to raise awareness of the life-saving role of blood and plasma donations; to encourage regular donations from both first timers and long-time donors; To promote values of compassion, community, and solidarity through giving; To call on governments to invest in sustainable national blood programs. Register to participate!
KEY MESSAGES: This year’s campaign reminds us that:
Safe blood saves lives. A single donation can help save up to three lives.
Every blood donation is a gift of hope. It can mean the difference between life and death for patients in need of transfusions.
Blood donation is a collective effort and a powerful act of solidarity. By coming together as a community of donors, we ensure a steady and safe blood supply for all who need it.
Anyone, anywhere, who needs a transfusion should have timely access to safe blood. Yet in many cases, particularly in emergencies or where donation systems are still developing, the demand often outpaces the supply.
Everyone who can donate blood should consider making regular voluntary, unpaid donations, so that all countries have adequate and reliable blood supplies.
Access to safe blood and blood product is essential for universal health coverage and a key component of effective health systems.
Governments and partners must invest in strong national blood programs to ensure universal access to safe blood transfusions.
Thank you to all blood donors for your invaluable contributions in bringing hope and saving lives.
Key messages also align with the year-long World Health Day campaign focused on maternal and newborn health: Give blood, give hope. Support maternal and child health for healthy beginnings, hopeful futures!
14 million women hemorrhage during childbirth every year. Timely access to safe blood transfusion is crucial for appropriate response and saving lives.
Severe bleeding during and after childbirth is a top cause of maternal death, particularly in developing countries.
Millions of babies and young children are also at risk: severe anemia, often resulting from malnutrition and malaria, claim many young lives.
Timely access to safe blood transfusions can prevent maternal and child deaths.
A blood donation can save a mother. A baby. A future.
SURVEY: Improve the impact of our public health campaigns by responding to this survey.
STATEMENTS: Read the Message from the WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on World Blood Donor Day 2025; June 14th; The Message from Dr Jarbas Barbosa, Director of PAHO on World Blood Donor Day 2025; The Message of the WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean Region, Dr Hanan Balkhy on World Blood Donor Day 2025; June 14th, and the Message of the WHO Regional Director for Africa; Dr. Mohamed Yakub Janabi, on World Blood Donor Day 2025; June 14th.
PODCASTS: Blood – the most precious gift. Safe blood saves lives. Regular blood donation by a sufficient number of healthy people is needed to ensure that blood will always be available whenever and wherever it is needed. Listen to the audio-podcasts!
CAMPAIGN MATERIALS: The need for blood is universal, but access to safe blood and safe blood products for all those who need it is not. Shortages of safe blood are particularly acute in many countries. We prepared the Poster and the Campaign assets to promote the day. We intend to inform the public that the intention of Donating Blood is an Act of Solidarity. Get the campaign materials!
WHY WE CELEBRATE THE DAY?
We observe the World Blood Donor Day to draw attention to the roles that voluntary blood donations play in saving lives and enhancing solidarity within communities.
The specific objectives of this year’s campaign are to:
Celebrate and thank individuals who donate blood and encourage more people to become new donors;
Encourage people in good health to donate blood regularly, as often as is safe and possible, to transform the quality of life for transfusion dependent patients and help to build a secure blood supply in all countries in the world;
Highlight the critical roles of voluntary non-remunerated regular blood and plasma donations in achieving universal access to safe blood products for all populations; and
mobilize support at national, regional and global levels among governments and development partners to invest in, strengthen and sustain national blood programmes.
HOW TO GET INVOLVED!
Prepare for a Great Donor Experience. Read the donor eligibility recommendations to give blood. After your first donation, or upon request, you will receive an Donor ID Card. You may use this card as an acceptable form of identification when you donate blood, platelets, or plasma.
Your involvement and support will help to ensure greater impact of the day by increasing recognition worldwide that giving blood is a life-saving act of solidarity and that services providing safe blood and blood products are an essential element of every health care system. A particular activity that countries in the world are encouraged to implement for this year’s campaign is to disseminate to various media outlets stories of people whose lives have been saved through blood donation as a way of motivating regular blood donors to continue giving blood, and to motivate people in good health who have never given blood to begin doing so.
Other activities that would help promote the slogan of this year’s World Blood Donor Day may include donor appreciation ceremonies, social networking campaigns, special media broadcasts, social media posts featuring individual blood donors with the slogan, meetings and workshops, musical and artistic events to thank blood donors and celebrate solidarity, and colouring iconic monuments red.
PARTNERSHIPS
One of WHO strategies is to assist low- and middle-income countries in the world in improving the availability and quality of human plasma, including optimising the utilisation of the plasma recovered from whole blood donations, and increasing patients’ access to the life-saving plasma protein therapies.
The World Blood Donor Day is organized by WHO Regional Offices, the WHO African Region, the ,WHO Region of the Americas, the WHO South-East Asia Region, the WHO European Region and the WHO Western Pacific Region.
Other contributors National Blood Service (NBS); The Australian Red Cross Lifeblood; The Japanese Red Cross Society; The America’s Blood Centers; The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, The National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID), The NZ Blood Service The Singapore Red Cross (SRC); The Centro Nacional de la Transfusión Sanguínea and the Gavrilov Blood Centre of Moscow's Department of Health and many others.