Host Jeremy C. Park talks with Keisha Walker, Community Affairs Manager with Vitalant Blood Donation, who highlights the nonprofit organization's mission and efforts to "unite blood and biologics donors, talent, and innovation to save and improve lives" and how donating blood helps save lives in our community. She touches on the local history dating back to Lifeblood and how Vitalant is one of the nation’s largest nonprofit blood and biotherapies healthcare organizations, providing hospitals and patients across the U.S. a safe blood supply. Vitalant has a network of about 115 donation centers across the U.S. and hosts approximately 60,000 blood drives annually. Vitalant provides blood and special services to patients in about 900 hospitals across the U.S., helping millions of people who depend on blood donations from generous volunteer donors. Keisha talks about Vitalant's four local donation centers and ongoing blood drives at schools, places of worship, and businesses, and how easy it is to donate blood. She shares some best practices and details the ongoing local need for volunteer blood donors and community parters to host blood drive campaigns. Keisha then highlights their MLK Spirit of Service Blood Drive Campaign, taking place January 2 to January 20, 2025 with the finale blood drive at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis on King Day. She talks about some of the special perks associated, including a commemorative T-shirt and front-of-the-line admission to the museum. Keisha wraps up talking about how the community can carry the spirit of service forward and support Vitalant throughout the year so Memphis can become more self-sufficient with the blood needed to save lives here in our community.

Visit https://www.vitalant.org to learn more about Vitalant and visit https://www.vitalant.org/mlkspiritofs... to learn more about the MLK Spirit of Service Blood Drive Campaign.
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