MCGI Donates 1,900 Blood Bags to Red Cross

Members Church of God International donated 1,900 blood bags to the Philippine Red Cross on March 13 this year, the group’s first simultaneous mass bloodletting for 2011.

Forty-four MCGI centers across the nation opened for the said event: seven in the National Capital Region, 18 others in Luzon, five in Visayas, and 14 in Mindanao.

This effort is just another of the many public service advocacies and commitments that MCGI, presided to by Bro. Eli Soriano and Bro. Daniel Razon, are continuously doing.

The bloodletting drive was organized by MCGI in cooperation with the Philippine National Red Cross (PNRC), the Kamanggagawa Foundation, and local network UNTV.

The Philippine National Red Cross is the Philippine government’s arm in sending aid to victims in disaster and conflict-stricken areas. It also provides humanitarian services, such as community health care and blood donation and distribution activities. The PNRC is the localized extension of the International Committee on the Red Cross based in Geneva, Switzerland.

MCGI received a special citation from the PNRC in 2009, naming the former as an outstanding blood donor, for giving a total of 2,689 bags of blood from January to October. Mass blood donation drives continued throughout the following year, the latest one on December 12 nationwide.

For their commitment to blood donating, MCGI leaders established an international Church agency, the Blood Donors Society. The said group organizes blood donation events and coordinates with both private and public institutions that promote the same principles as the PNRC such as awareness campaigns and volunteer searches.  Weekly, the BDS conducts bloodletting at MCGI headquarters in Pampanga.

Bro. Eli Soriano and Bro. Daniel Razon have been supporting public service activities such as blood donation drives. Their concern for the well-being of people having blood diseases and problems extended to their purchase of several dialysis machines to give treatment to people with kidney problems – for free. The machines are stationed at the ADD Infirmary in the MCGI Central Office in Pampanga.

(Written by: Cecile Vizcaya)