Expatriate Keralites donate blood

RIYADH — The blood donation camp organized by Keli, an expatriate Keralites cultural and charity community organization in Riyadh on Sept. 2, attracted a huge crowd. More than 500 people attended the blood donation camp and around 400 people donated blood on that day. The camp was organized by Keli, in association with King Saud Medical City (Shimeshi Hospital), Riyadh. The camp began at 9:00 a.m. and continued throughout the day till 6:00 p.m. Members of the organization and other expatriate Keralites in large groups started arriving at the camp from early morning. All arrangements were made by the Blood Bank authorities. All participants were provided with food and soft drinks. Well equipped medical team headed by Dr. Khaled Ibrahim Zawbe, director of Blood Bank, King Saudi Medical City, carried out the blood drawing operations. Twenty beds and blood drawing machines were put to use to draw blood from twenty persons at a time. On seeing the huge crowd arriving at the camp to voluntarily donate blood, Dr. Kaled Ibrahim Zawbe said, “It clearly shows the dedication and commitment of Indian people, especially expatriate Keralites, towards humanity and the noble cause of blood donation.” Dr. Zawbe also expressed his appreciation and congratulated the members of the expatriate’s charity organization, Keli, for taking initiative in successfully organizing the blood donation camp this year also in a very short time at the request of Blood Bank authorities of King Saudi Medical City. Last year also during Haj season, Keli, in association with King Saud Medical City, Riyadh had organized a camp where more than 700 attended the camp and about 600 people donated blood. Rasheed Melethil, secretary of the organization said, not only Keralites, but people from various other nationalities and also people from other states of India like UP, Bihar and Tamil Nadu came forward voluntarily to donate blood at the camp. “It is part of our continuous charity program to donate blood at different hospitals in Riyadh whenever need arises, in addition to various charity and philanthropic activities,”, Melethil added. K.R. Unnikrishnan (chief patron), Rasheed Melethil (secretary), Shameer Kunnummal (joint secreatry), Baburaj Kappil and Kishor E Nissam (charity wing) and other members of the charity wing of Keli supervized the activities at the blood donation camp.