Fonkou Steve: What If We’ve Been Asking the Wrong Question About Plasma Too?
Fonkou Steve, Regional Representative for Africa- Global Blood Safety Working Party (Leadership board) at International Society of Blood Transfusion (ISBT), Chief Visionary Officer at Blood Track, shared a post on LinkedIn:
“What If We’ve Been Asking the Wrong Question About Plasma Too?
Last week, I shared a thought about blood donation:
Perhaps we spend too much time asking why people don’t donate, and too little time asking how we make donation possible.
The more I reflect on it, the more I wonder if the same applies to source plasma.
Around the world, the demand for plasma-derived medicinal products (PDMPs) – especially immunoglobulins – continues to outpace supply.
The debate often centres on one question: Should plasma donors be paid?
But what if that’s the wrong question?
What if we rather asked: Have we made plasma donation accessible enough?
Whole blood donation has evolved by taking donation to communities through mobile blood drives.
Source plasma, however, remains largely dependent on fixed plasmapheresis centres.
Could this be limiting the growth of voluntary plasma donation?
Imagine if advances in technology made mobile plasmapheresis practical, safe, and affordable.
Would more people donate?
Could more countries move closer to plasma self-sufficiency?
Could eradicate this shortage by changing how we collect plasma?
I don’t know the answers.
But I believe these are questions worth exploring.
Sometimes the biggest innovations in healthcare don’t come from changing people.
They come from redesigning the system around them.
Could improving access to plasma donation become part of the solution to the global PDMP shortage?
I’d love to hear the perspectives of colleagues working in transfusion medicine, plasma collection, fractionation, and health policy.”
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