15 Interesting Facts About Blood
Blood donation. It’s about an hour of your time. It’s About Life. Giving blood will not decrease your strength.
- One pint of donated blood can save up to 3 lives.
- A newborn baby has about one cup of blood in his body.
- The blood you donate is sold on the open market and it’s a US$4.5 billion per year industry.
- It would take 1,200,000 mosquitoes, each sucking once, to completely drain the average human of blood.
- Only female mosquitoes drink blood. Males are vegetarians.
- There are 100,000 miles of blood vessels in an adult human body.
- James Christopher Harrison (born 27 December 1936), OAM, also known as the Man with the Golden Arm, is a blood plasma donor from Australia whose unusual plasma composition has been used to make a treatment for Rhesus disease. He has made over 1000 donations throughout his lifetime, and these donations are estimated to have saved over 2.4 million unborn babies from the condition. On 11 May 2018 he made his 1173rd donation – his last, as Australian policy prohibits blood donations from those past age 81.
- Blood circulating in your body is composed of about 55 percent plasma, 40 percent red blood cells, 4 percent platelets, and 1 percent white blood cells. Of the white blood cells in blood circulation, neutrophils are the most abundant.
- Human blood contains metals atoms including iron, chromium, manganese, zinc, lead, and copper. You may also be surprised to know that blood contains small amounts of gold. The human body has about 0.2 milligrams of gold that is mostly found in the blood.
- Blood Cells Have Different Life Spans. Matured human blood cells have varying life cycles. Red blood cells circulate in the body for about 4 months, platelets for about 9 days, and white blood cells range from a few hours to several days.
- Exposing a person’s skin to the sun’s rays reduces blood pressure by causing levels of nitric oxide to rise in the blood. Nitric oxide helps to regulate blood pressure by reducing blood vessel tone. This reduction in blood pressure could cut the risks of developing heart disease or stroke.
- The most common blood type in the United States is O positive. The least common is AB negative. Blood type distributions vary by population. The most common blood type in Japan is A positive
- About 1 in 7 people entering a hospital need blood.
- Four main red blood cell types: A, B, AB and O. Each can be positive or negative for the Rh factor. AB is the universal recipient; O negative is the universal donor of red blood cells.
- Plasma, which is 90 percent water, makes up 55 percent of blood volume.
