Estonia has a total of four blood centers – in Tartu, Tallinn, Kohtla-Järve and Pärnu. Around 30,000 people across the country regularly donate blood.

New donors, however, remain scarce.

"There aren't very many new ones," admitted Tartu University Hospital (TÜK) Blood Center director Helve König. "Last year there were around a thousand new donors; right now there's around just over 500. That figure has fallen sharply over the years. Two and three years ago we had as many as 4,000 first-time donors."

According to Gulara Khanirzayeva, director of donations at North Estonia Medical Center's (PERH) Blood Center, the ideal donor rate is 4 percent of the population. In Estonia, however, the current rate is just over half that.

"There's talk of some sort of percentages, but in reality it all depends on need," König nonetheless explained. "If you have patients, you'll also need blood. In periods of less need for blood, there's also less need for donors."

Plenty of campaigns encourage people to donate blood too, however according to the TÜK Blood Center chief, blood donation can't take place on a campaign basis; blood donations have to be continuous.

At PERH, Khanirzayeva noted that donor traffic also dries up in summer because people travel during their summer vacations. Restrictions apply to donating blood as well, such as a two-month wait period following international travel or a tick bite.

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