Your browser doesn't support javascript.
Prosocial behavior in emergencies: Evidence from blood donors recruitment and retention during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Bilancini, Ennio; Boncinelli, Leonardo; Di Paolo, Roberto; Menicagli, Dario; Pizziol, Veronica; Ricciardi, Emiliano; Serti, Francesco.
  • Bilancini E; IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy.
  • Boncinelli L; Department of Economics and Management, University of Florence, Italy.
  • Di Paolo R; IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy.
  • Menicagli D; IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy.
  • Pizziol V; IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy.
  • Ricciardi E; IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy.
  • Serti F; IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca, Italy. Electronic address: francesco.serti@imtlucca.it.
Soc Sci Med ; 314: 115438, 2022 Dec.
Article in English | MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-2082478
ABSTRACT
The impact of COVID-19 represents a specific challenge for voluntary transfusional systems sustained by the intrinsic motivations of blood donors. In general, health emergencies can stimulate altruistic behaviors. However, in this context, the same prosocial motivations, besides the personal health risks, could foster the adherence to social distancing rules to preserve collective health and, therefore, discourage blood donation activities. In this work, we investigate the consequences of the pandemic shock on the dynamics of new donors exploiting the individual-level longitudinal information contained in administrative data on the Italian region of Tuscany. We compare the change in new donors' recruitment and retention during 2020 with respect to the 2017-2019 period (we observe 9511 individuals), considering donors' and their municipalities of residence characteristics. Our results show an increment of new donors, with higher proportional growth for older donors. Moreover, we demonstrate that the quality of new donors, as proxied by the frequency of subsequent donations, increased with respect to previous years. Finally, we show that changes in extrinsic motivations, such as the possibility of obtaining a free antibody test or overcoming movement restrictions, cannot explain the documented increase in the number of new donors and in their performance. Therefore, our analyses indicate that the Tuscan voluntary blood donation system was effective in dealing with the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Subject(s)
Keywords

Full text: Available Collection: International databases Database: MEDLINE Main subject: Blood Donors / COVID-19 Type of study: Observational study / Prognostic study Limits: Humans Language: English Journal: Soc Sci Med Year: 2022 Document Type: Article Affiliation country: J.socscimed.2022.115438

Similar

MEDLINE

...
LILACS

LIS


Full text: Available Collection: International databases Database: MEDLINE Main subject: Blood Donors / COVID-19 Type of study: Observational study / Prognostic study Limits: Humans Language: English Journal: Soc Sci Med Year: 2022 Document Type: Article Affiliation country: J.socscimed.2022.115438