Sunday, June 14, 2015, has been designated World Blood Donor Day On Tuesday, June 9, RTE s Southern Editor Paschal Sheehy will be among a group of cyclists leaving Cork for a 1,000-kilometre cycle to Geneva. The cycle aims to arrive at the headquarters of the World Health Organisation on June 14, World Blood Donor Day.
The event is called the Blood4Life Cycle.
Blood4Life aims to raise awareness about the importance of blood donation, and to encourage people to become blood donors, if they can. All the participants in the cycle are volunteers, giving their time -- and the months it has taken them to train for the event -- for free.
Blood4Life was founded by Stephen Roe, a garda based in Cork City.
In March, 2005, Stephen Roe s son Alex was diagnosed with leukaemia. Five years of treatment followed. During that time, Alex received 50 blood transfusions, before he died on May 31, 2010. Alex was just 21.
"The blood transfusions which Alex received kept him alive," says Stephen Roe.
"When Alex was first diagnosed and needed blood, I expected it to be there. I hadn t thought about the blood donors and donations that are required to ensure that our hospitals have a constant supply of blood.
"Donating blood is an extraordinary gift, and blood donations save lives in this country every day of the week."
Stephen Roe is now appealing to people to become blood donors, and appealing to lapsed donors to consider giving again.
"One pint of blood can save three people s lives" Stephen says. "But up to 150,000 donations are required every year in Ireland and each donation only lasts a month, so it s vital that blood banks are kept topped up. At any given time there is only between three and five days blood supply for the entire country."
The Blood4Life Cycle is in its third year. Previous cycles have taken participants from Malin Head to Mizen Head (2013) and through the 26 counties (2014).
RT s Southern Editor Paschal Sheehy has been there from the beginning, for his own personal reasons.
"My father, Jerry, died of cancer in 1997," Paschal says. "Throughout his illness he received regular blood transfusions. I saw what a blood transfusion meant to my father - it meant life. Without regular transfusions, my father s time between diagnosis and death would have been much shorter, and we may not have had the time to do the things which we got to do, like -- most importantly -- telling each other that we loved each other and saying goodbye."
The Blood4Life cyclists will travel from Cork to Rosslare on Tuesday, before boarding a ferry to Cherbourg. Day two takes the cyclists from Cherbourg to the city of Caen. On Thursday the cyclists will travel 180 kilometres from Caen to Chartres. Friday and Saturday will feature two 200-kilometre spins from Chartres to Auxere and Auxere to Chalon Sur Saone. The Alps await on Sunday, before the cyclists descend into Geneva and the headquarters of the World Health Organisation on the organisation s designated World Blood Donor Day.
"The theme of this year s World Blood Donor Day is to thank blood donors for saving lives every day through their blood donations," says Paschal Sheehy. "But we are also appealing to others to become donors or to give again, if you haven t made a donation in a while."
Information on becoming a blood donor is available on www.giveblood.ie.
You can follow the cyclists progress on their facebook page on Blood for Life Cycle.
@paschalsheehy will also be tweeting about #Blood4Life during his trip.
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Sunday, June 14, 2015, has been designated World Blood Donor Day On Tuesday, June 9, RTE s Southern Editor Paschal Sheehy will be among a group of cyclists leaving Cork for a 1,000-kilometre cycle to Geneva. The cycle aims to arrive at the headquarters of the World Health Organisation on June 14, World Blood Donor Day.
