How One Blood Donor Saved Over 2 Million Babies

A man with a rare antibody in his blood spent 63 years donating, and has touched millions of lives. Learn how in this episode of BrainStuff. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff,
Lauren Vogel bomb here. When currently eighty one year old
John Harrison was just fourteen years old, he received a
blood transfusion following a major chest surgery. He had a
lung removed and thirteen units or pints of other people's
blood that's nearly two gallons, made their life saving way

(00:23):
into his veins. That transfusion inspired Harrison's later generosity. He
promised to begin donating once he turned eighteen, and did
so weakly until May eleven, eighteen, when, according to the
Australian Red Cross, he gave his final donation. He's fine,
that's just the maximum age in Australia for giving blood.

(00:44):
Harrison's prolific donation is notable enough that in two thousand three,
Guinness World Records recognized his achievement for the most blood
donated by a single person. His record was broken in
but would say it's still nothing to sneeze at, and
Harrison's blood is notable not only for quantity, but also
for quality. He's credited with saving the lives of more

(01:05):
than two million Australian babies. Harrison, known in Australia as
The man with the golden arm produces a rare and
powerful antibody in his blood called r H d immunoglobin
or anti D. It protects unborn babies from the potentially
deadly condition r H incompatibility. When a pregnant woman with

(01:26):
an r H negative blood type carries a baby with
RH positive blood, the woman's body mistakenly treats the baby's
red blood cells like an outside threat. Her body produces
antibodies to combat what it perceives as an invader, with
potentially deadly effect. Miscarriage, still birth, fetal brain damage, and
anemia are all possible outcomes. Australian doctors have theorized that

(01:49):
the transfusion that Harrison received as a team may have
contributed to the unique composition of the blood his body
now produces. Harrison made his final contribution at the town
Hall Donor Center in Sydney, Australia, surrounded by mothers and
their children who had benefited from the treatment, as well
as large silver balloons in the shape of the numerals one,
one seven, three, one thousand, one hundred and seventy three

(02:12):
being the number of times Harrison donated blood throughout his life.
Harrison told a Sydney Morning Herald reporter attending the final donation.
It's a sad day for me, the end of a
long run. Robin Barlow, the r H program coordinator who
recruited James to be the program's first donor, told the
newspaper every ampule of anti D ever made in Australia

(02:33):
has James in it. Since the very first mother received
her dose at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in nineteen sixty seven.
It's an enormous thing. He's saved millions of babies. Approximately
seventeen percent of pregnant Australian women received doses of anti D.
That number includes Harrison's own daughter, Tracy Mellowship, who was
treated in nineteen two and gave birth to a healthy

(02:55):
son named Scott in When Scott turned sixteen and eleven,
he gave his first blood donation, sitting next to his
grandfather who was marking his thousand. But there's a bit
of a twist. Harrison, who received the Metal of the
Order of Australia in nineteen ninety nine, has had a
lifelong fear of needles. In his more than six decades

(03:16):
of donating blood, He's never watched a nurse insert and
needle in his arm, preferring to look away. Today's episode
was written by Christopher Hasiotis and produced by Tyler Clang.
For more on this and lots of other heartwarming topics,
literally because of the bloody visit our home planet, how

(03:37):
stuff works dot com