An appeal to blood donors this week - Blood drives will be held despite a
strike by certain Héma-Québec unions

MONTREAL, June 14 /CNW Telbec/ - Héma-Québec is appealing to blood donors, asking them to come to the blood drive sites during the five-day strike announced by three Montréal facility unions affiliated with the CSN on June 15, 16, 17, 18 and 19. Héma-Québec would like to remind the public that all scheduled blood drives will be maintained.

Héma-Québec is asking the public to give blood generously: 1,000 blood donations are needed each day to meet the hospitals' needs.

"We hope that we will reach a settlement with the CSN unions representing the Montréal facility so that we can continue to fulfill our mission under the best conditions possible. We are, moreover, delighted with respect to the agreement in principle reached on May 16 with the office employees who are members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Local 3807, as well as the agreement reached, on June 6, with the nurses who are members of the Syndicat du personnel infirmier d'Héma-Québec (SPI-CSQ), affiliated with the Centrale des syndicats du Québec (CSQ) and the Fédération de la santé du Québec (FSQ-CSQ)," said Manon Pepin, Héma-Québec spokesperson.

Héma-Québec would like to point out that this conflict does not affect all of its personnel, but only those employees represented by three unions out of nine, concerning 375 people of the 1,300 Héma-Québec employees. All of the personnel required will be present to welcome blood donors at the mobile blood drives and the Globule Blood Donor Centres. Blood drives scheduled in the Capitale-Nationale, Chaudière-Appalaches, Mauricie, Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean, Côte-Nord, Bas-Saint-Laurent and Gaspésie regions will not be affected since they are organized with personnel from other unions.

About Héma-Québec

Héma-Québec aims to efficiently provide adequate quantities of safe, optimal blood components, substitutes, human tissues and cord blood to meet all Quebecers' needs; provide and develop expertise along with specialized and innovative services and products in the fields of transfusion medicine and human tissue transplantation.

Héma-Québec counts 1,300 employees, some 2,000 blood drives and more than 300,000 blood donors every year, 16,000 partner volunteers and more than 485,000 blood products annually delivered to hospitals in Quebec to fulfill patients' needs.

Give blood. Give life.

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For further information: Manon Pepin, Vice-President, Public Affairs and Marketing, 514-832-0871, [email protected]; Source: Laurent Paul Ménard, Director - External Communications