Bee A Hero: Test your blood type at the Unity Cup Finals

Brentford FC Community Sports Trust and Brentford Football Club are calling on the local community, fans and supporters to find out their blood type and register as a blood donor.

Get your blood type tested for free to see if your blood can be used to treat sickle cell.

The Unity Cup finals will take place at Gtech Community Stadium this Saturday 31 May.

Before kick-off between Ghana and Trinidad and Tobago at 12pm, fans can visit the Community Stadium Hub next to the stadium to have their blood type tested.

The testing event is part of Brentford FC Community Sports Trust’s Bee A Hero campaign, which is aimed at addressing a local, regional and national need for more blood donors.

Visit the Community Stadium Hub, opposite Entrance F of the stadium, between 10am and 12pm to test your blood type.

Club ambassador and former Jamaica international Marcus Gayle will be there to greet supporters and chat about the club and Trust’s work on the Bee A Hero campaign, aimed at helping drive registrations for blood donation and finding people whose blood can be used to treat blood disorders such as sickle cell.

Gayle will also take part in a panel discussion about the campaign and sickle cell during the event, alongside Calvin Campbell, who has lived with sickle cell his entire life and works with the NHS to advocate for more people to give life-saving blood donations. Find out more about Calvin’s work in the video below.

You can also enter a prize draw to win a signed Brentford shirt at the event.

About Bee A Hero

In the UK, an average of 4,300 blood donations are needed every day to meet the demands of our hospitals. Blood donors from all backgrounds are required to ensure there is the right blood available for patients who need it.

Bee A Hero also aims to engage with the Black community. Currently, only two per cent of donors in England are Black. 12,000 new Black heritage donors are needed to meet the growing demand for better-matched blood to treat blood disorders such as sickle cell.

Black blood donors are ten times more likely to have the Ro and B positive blood types urgently needed to treat the 15,000 people in the UK suffering from sickle cell disease.

People of all backgrounds are invited to get their blood tested and join the blood donor register at Bee A Hero events, and we encourage you to come down and take part.

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