McArthur gives blood at local SNBTS donation drive   

Orkney’s MSP Liam McArthur today visited the Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service donation drive held at the Pickaquoy centre to give blood.   

SNBTS are back in Orkney for the first time in over 15 years, having last visited to hold blood donation sessions in 2009, and after feasibility studies conducted in 2017 concluded there were "significant issues" in transporting blood reliably back to the mainland.        

Mr McArthur has been campaigning for the service to make more regular visits to Orkney since the original pilot was held, given the decline in overall donations in Scotland over recent years and high levels of support amongst island residents.   

The SNBTS will run further sessions on the 13th & 14th May, from 9am-2pm in the Pickaquoy Centre, and you can find out more here: https://www.scotblood.co.uk/ 

Commenting after the visit, Mr McArthur said:   

“After many years of campaigning for SNBTS to make a return to Orkney, I was absolutely delighted to have had the opportunity to give blood at the donation drive at the Picky this morning. I was also delighted but not surprised to hear that the response from the Orkney public has been exceptionally positive and the Picky was certainly busy today.

“I’d like to thank Professor Marc Turner and the team at SNBTS for their work to make this visit possible and find solutions to the previous issues with transportation and storage. The amazing volunteer SNBTS teams who made the journey from Aberdeen and Dundee to run the sessions also deserve enormous credit and seemed to be enjoying their visit to the islands.  

“I hope that the high levels of take up seen this morning, and which I’m sure will continue throughout the week, will help persuade SNBTS to look at making these visits a much more regular occurrence.”