A lifesaving Mother's Day

We’ve teamed up with Moonpig to create a range of Mother’s Day cards that celebrate the amazing achievements of mums and encourage dads and sons to give blood.

The ten humorous and heartfelt cards have a light-hearted twist on the serious topic of blood donation and transfusions.

Around one in five women suffer a bleed during childbirth, with about 1% suffering the most severe form of post-birth bleed.

Around 6% of donated blood is given to mothers during childbirth – around 50,000 units a year.

Two of the cards are especially poignant as they were designed by children whose mums’ lives were saved by blood transfusions.  

Laura Scott experienced a severe bleed while giving birth to her son Henry at 30 weeks and received 22 units of blood.

Henry’s card features a heart alongside the words ‘Mummy, I give you my heart. Daddy gives blood. Because we love you!’.

Laura said: “I’m so lucky to be alive. Donating blood may not seem much, only being an hour of your time and enjoying a cuppa and a biscuit afterwards, but it honestly couldn't be a bigger deal. You save lives.”

Kirsty Armstrong suffered a large bleed during the birth of her third child and needed 20 units of blood to save her life.

In light of this, her 12-year-old daughter designed a card showing a blood bag entitled ‘We love you’.

Kirsty said, “I am incredibly grateful to all blood donors for their generosity, as without them I wouldn’t be here.”

Men make great blood donors

It’s particularly important that men donate as women are unable to for at least six months after birth.

Men’s blood is also very useful as it’s almost exclusively used in complete blood transfusions for babies and for transfusions in the womb.  

Dale Boreham, design and publishing manager at Moonpig, said, “We know childbirth is one of the leading uses of blood donation so we wanted to help highlight the life-changing difference dads can make to their family and others by giving blood.”  

Last year, only 41% of new donors were men, so it’s vitally important than more men try donating for the first time.

We need 400 new donors every day to keep a strong donor base and collect 5,000 donations every day.

Tom Aggett, lead for male blood donor recruitment at NHS Blood and Transplant, said, “Registering as a new donor may not seem like a traditional Mother’s Day gift but it really is something meaningful you can do to celebrate mums and save lives.

“Giving blood is amazing and so we hope the cards will encourage more fathers to save lives by signing up to donate.”

Find out more about our partnership with Moonpig or check out the cards here.