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James Harrison, Who Has Helped Save Lives of More Than 2.4 Million Australian Babies, Retires (cnn.com)
Most people, when they retire, get a gold watch. James Harrison deserves so much more than that. From a report: Harrison, known as the "Man With the Golden Arm," has donated blood nearly every week for 60 years. After all those donations, the 81-year-old Australian man "retired" Friday. The occasion marked the end of a monumental chapter. According to the Australian Red Cross Blood Service, he has helped saved the lives of more than 2.4 million Australian babies. Harrison's blood has unique, disease-fighting antibodies that have been used to develop an injection called Anti-D, which helps fight against rhesus disease. This disease is a condition where a pregnant woman's blood actually starts attacking her unborn baby's blood cells. In the worst cases, it can result in brain damage, or death, for the babies.
Yes, Democrats have a well-known negative stance about Rh-positive babies. Including A+, B+, AB+, and of course O+(?)
Oooh-kay. For those of you not familiar with basic newborn hematology, if a mom has Rh-negative blood (relatively rare compared at 15% to Rh-positive blood) and the baby has Rh-positive blood, and during pregnancy the mom's blood gets exposed to babies (can happen in car accidents and other placental problems resulting in fetal-maternal hemorrhage - the fetus's blood ends up in mom's circulation) the mom will start to make antibodies against the babies Rh antigens (more specifically, Rh-D antigens - there's more than one - Rhesus is a whole group; the D antigen is the troublesome one). This is one of the reasons couples contemplating marriage used to get blood tests in the United States, before the introduction of the medicine folks like James Harrison made possible.
In the United States, anti-D is typically referred to by its brand name, RhoGAM. It has antibodies to Rh-D - just a small amount, though. You inject this into a mom, her immune system detects them, and then if it sees actual anti-D from the fetus her immune system doesn't freak out and attack the fetal blood cells. Now and then we run into patients who do not like vaccines, which RhoGAM more or less is. The first baby is fine. The second baby to be exposed will often die (NSFW: pictures). In babies who don't die from hemolytic disease of the newborn (where their blood cells are destroyed, by maternal antibodies, among other problems) they can suffer brain damage. Treatment involves exchange transfusion and, in less severe cases, phototherapy, where we shine 460 nm light on them for a few days—hopefully not knocking too many DNA off the strand in the process.
Alternatively, you can take your chances with red raspberry and nettle tea, according to this person who claims to uphold evidence-based wellness, though she doesn't actually cite any evidence.
RhoGAM is made from pooled human plasma, like the gentleman cited in the article. He just happened to have a substantial amount of the antibodies, likely the result of blood transfusion exposure.
I think not.
TFA says he donated a bit over 1100 times over 60 years.
For the calendar-challenged among us, there are 3128 weeks in 60 years. And 1100 is NOT almost 3128....
Note that this should not be read to denigrate the phenomenal amount of blood this guy donated over the years. Just the idiots who put "nearly every week" into TFA....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
You don't have the slightest idea what you are talking about.
Children of Rhesus negative mothers and Rhesus positive fathers will be Rhesus positive and at risk of their mother developing antibodies to their blood (as as second child after the mother has been sensitised by the first child, or as the result of the mother being exposed to the child's blood). High risk of still birth or major problems for the child.
If this is prevented, they aren't affected. They go on to be Rhesus positive. Like the majority of the population. In as much as Rhesus negative is as low as 10% in some populations, by increasing the number of surviving Rhesus positive children you are _reducing_ the risk in the general population over time.
We should use CRISPR to splice his gene for the anit-body into another donor.
A bone marrow transplant might also work.
Assuming he only gets usual donation rates, then the guy should get an award. That is an impressive lifetime of service that I doubt anyone could even begin to aspire to. Sure it was a fluke of genetics probably, but he was consistent, and went every week...
Blood donors in Australia get $0.