American Red Cross struggles to keep blood drives running

Staff at the American Red Cross in Roseburg said they rely on schools and businesses to host blood drives at their buildings.

Douglas county due to coronavirus concerns.

Kezi 9 news reporter evita garza shows us how the american red cross in douglas county is stepping in to get the drives rescheduled.

Trt: 1:28 00:00 take lower?im healthy, im not afraid of needles and i need to give blood?

James mahaffy regularly donates at the monthly blood drive held at his office.

He works for the bureau of land management&but their scheduled blood drive was canceled.

00:13 james mahaffy, donor?were all teleworking from home or working in the field.

So it was relocated to the american red cross site?

Since march, the american red cross has canceled at least twenty blood drives in douglas county.

They rely on businesses and schools to host blood drives& now that theye all closed, staff say it a challenge to find places to host elsewhere.

Phoner:?we get 20% of our blood from the high schools, colleges.

When theye closed, that a problem?

00:43 evita:?even though a blood drive isn being held at their office today like normal... mahaffy says he glad they were able to do it at all.

Especially because other places don have the same opportunity??if our office is open, it will be there.

If it not, itl be here.

Gotta keep going with the mission?

Account manager valerie gordon says some blood drives were reschduled in new locations.?wee had a ton of companies that have come forward and wanted to host drives?

The next blood drive is on april 22nd at the holiday inn express in roseburg.

It was originally scheduled at roseburg high school.

"this is just one of those things that we need to do."

Mahaffy hopes a rescheduled blood drive doesn stop others from donating.

In roseburg,