Kansas City, Mo. — During the summer months, blood donations typically drop. However, new research has found that giving people freebies such as t-shirts and gift cards does increase donations.
The Food and Drug Administration says people cannot be given incentives for the actual blood donation. The freebies are for showing up to donate — whether or not you can actually give.
The new review in the journal Science found the greater the incentive — say a day off work as opposed to a t-shirt — the more likely people are to donate. The researcher at the University of Toronto Mississauga also found no evidence that freebies reduce the safety of the blood supply or attract less-than-ideal donors.
Fox 4 News spoke with Stann Tate of the Community Blood Center who says baseball tickets are probably the biggest incentive in the Kansas City metro area.