OPINION: Stop this senseless blood shedding in DR Congo!

There are many instances at hospitals when safe blood transfusion becomes a life-saving intervention for patients. A good flow of blood is needed for the oxygen God has freely given us, to work in our bodies to produce energy.

The oxygen we breathe in is transported by red blood cells to our whole bodies (all the organs and tissues in the body), and it helps produce energy that we need for every activity that we carry out. No wonder people who have lost a lot of blood often need oxygen therapy as they get blood transfusion.

In Tanzania and the large East Africa, blood is never sold, it is donated. Private hospitals get the precious liquid from public hospitals, which manage blood banks. When a patient needs the vital liquid, at times relatives are asked to donate, or show a blood donor card.

The reason why blood and body parts like eyes, kidneys or other vital organs that maybe used as transplants for the sick are not sold is because the life of human beings is so valuable, you cannot place monetary value on it.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO) the “blood collection from voluntary, unpaid donors, whose blood is screened for infections, is the cornerstone of a safe and sufficient blood supply in all countries.”

The World Blood Donor Day on every June is set aside to encourage more people to do the needful. Unfortunately, in some countries, blood to save lives is collected from paid donors.

As I write this, I am thinking of Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), where a lot of innocent blood has been shed over many decades. People should only give out their blood to save lives, and should not shed blood, leading to needless deaths.

According to the United Nations, about 900 people were killed in political related ethnic violence last month alone. Many others allegedly could also have been killed and dumped in the Congo River. The 900 figure is just for the villagers in the northwestern part of the DRC, and hospitals in the areas had to struggle with getting blood to save lives of some of the wounded.

Sometimes, it does not make sense, why there should be such deaths in the DRC, such a poor country yet so rich! How can the country, which is the world’s leading miner of cobalt (used in electric car batteries and mobile phones), be so poor? the DRC is Africa’s biggest copper producer, and has great gold and diamonds mines, and so many other minerals!

Let me repeat that human life is so valuable, and is a gift from God, one of the worst crime world over, is to take another person’s life. Senseless deaths in the DRC must stop.

The DRC at the moment is waiting for a constitutional court to validate or invalidate the declared winner of a presidential election, Felix Tshisekedi, leader of the DRC’s main opposition party, the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS). There have been mixed feelings about the elections, with the Southern African Development Community, SADC, calling a government of national unity.

A year ago, it seemed like the incumbent President Joseph Kabila, would never let go, the presidency. An opposition candidate has been declared winner. We can only pray that, whatever the constitutional court rules, both the government and the opposition parties will accept.

I guess people in Congo and others across the world, all they want is peace and prosperity. This will not only mean better prospects for the DRC- Africa’s second largest country, but for Africa as a whole. The description of the country as full of “deadly violence, insurgencies, graft and poverty” should become a thing of the past, as the new president takes over.