A BBC article about efficiency savings being made by the NHS Blood and Transplant service caught my eye today as the maths seems decidedly wonky.

The key parts from the article itself :

NHS hospitals in England and North Wales are saving millions of pounds because the price charged for donated blood has gone down.

The organisation which collects, processes, tests and distributes blood says it has been able to pass on efficiency savings to the NHS.

The price of a quarter of a litre of blood has gone down from £140 to £125.

NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) says that equates to savings of around £50m over two years.

NHSBT has 1.4m registered donors, who gave almost 2m units of blood last year.

A UK unit of blood is 450ml (source).

From the article, savings per quarter liter or 250ml are £15 per year with 2 million units being donated annually.

Savings to the NHS are given as £50 million over two years or £25 million per year.

Now, 2 million units at 450ml per unit gives 900000 liters and a saving of £15 per 250ml on that volume translates to £54 million per year (900,000 * 4 * £15).

The question here in my mind is that either more than half the donated blood is being discarded or someone is trousering £29 million per year (£54m calculated – £25m per year quoted) possibly to facilitate budget reductions during the current squeeze. As a financial analyst, I would vote for the latter.

It is also possible,of course, that half the donations go towards blood products such as platelets and such like but with the usual standard of simplistic BBC journalism we will just have to speculate.