Our speaker on November 29th was Nick Canedo, Vice President of Community Engagement for We are Blood, which is the Austin area's local blood bank. As noted on their website, the mission of We are Blood is " To provide and protect the community blood supply, to inspire Central Texans to save lives locally, and to always treat everyone we serve as family." Nick explained how blood donation work, i.e. usually through donor centers such as We are Blood. We are Blood serves a 10-county service area in central Texas, providing blood for all of the hospitals in that area. 200 donations are needed every day to meet the blood needs in Central Texas. We Are Blood has four donor centers that collect about 60 percent of the blood donations. The other 40 percent comes from mobile blood drives. They are building back up their mobile drives since the pandemic. The need for blood is growing with population growth in Central Texas. There is also a strong need for platelet donations. These donations expire seven days after being donated, so platelet donors are in great need. We are Blood is trying to plan ahead for natural disasters, which can create storm closures and cause collections to go down. Besides becoming a donor, We are Blood can use volunteers. Their volunteer program includes canteen hosts, transportation drivers - pick up blood donations, and public relations volunteers at events to get the word out to help recruit blood donors! For more information go to:www.weareblood.org.