More than 80 pet owners have registered their cats and dogs to donate blood since a pet blood bank was opened in Kaohsiung’s Lingya District (苓雅) on April 27, National Pingtung University of Science and Technology (NPUST) Veterinary Transfusion Medicine Center director Tsai Yi-lun (蔡宜倫) said on Thursday.
The pet blood bank, jointly operated by NPUST and National Kaohsiung Normal University (NKNU), is located on NKNU’s Ho-Ping Campus (和平).
The blood bank would help address the perennial blood shortage at regional veterinarian clinics, Tsai said.
While many pet owners are willing to donate, issues of time, distance and venue often restrict their ability to do so, she said.
NKNU’s decision to allow its building to be used as a permanent blood bank would be incredibly helpful to the center, she said.
Pet owners who are interested in donating blood should book an appointment for Saturday next week or May 26, she said, adding that the facility is open to donors on two Saturdays of every month.
Healthy dogs between the ages of one and eight that weigh more than 20kg should be able to donate 250ml of blood, she said.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
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