Summer holidays, apathy, a lack of awareness and new blood donation restrictions have led to a shortage in local blood supplies, according to area blood banks.

"The blood supply has reached an extremely critical level," said Tracy Laubach, marketing communications manager for the Greater Chesapeake and Potomac regional branch of the American Red Cross. "... It's pretty serious."

The branch supplies blood to 80 hospitals and trauma centers in the Washington, D.C. area, including most of Maryland, northern Virginia and southern Pennsylvania. The region needs an average of 1,300 units of blood donated every day and ideally will have between five and seven days worth of blood in storage at any given time.

Inova Blood Donor Services, part of the nonprofit Inova Health System, services 15 hospitals in the region and requires 200 units of blood to be donated every day.

Each service has less than one day's supply on hand.

The blood shortage has not yet adversely affected the county's hospitals, although the Red Cross' standing orders to some hospitals have been cut by as much as 50 percent, Laubach said.

"Just because we have a good supply now doesn't mean there won't be a need in the future," warned Robert Jepson, a spokesman for Shady Grove Adventist Hospital and Washington Adventist Hospital, both of which receive blood primarily from the Red Cross. "It's important for the public to continue to give blood to ensure the levels will remain ... adequate."

Ronna Borenstein, a spokeswoman for Suburban Hospital, which is serviced primarily by Inova, said the hospital has not needed to cancel or delay any procedures due to a blood shortage.

Likewise, Montgomery General Hospital has had no difficulty getting blood from Inova, its primary supplier, but the hospital encourages people to continue donating blood, according to Barbara Caldwell of the hospital's blood lab.

"There's always a need," Caldwell said. "We always encourage people to donate."

If donations don't step up, hospitals may have to delay or cancel elective surgeries, and doctors may need to decide which patients do or don't get blood, Laubach said.

One of the reasons the supplies are so low is because summer is traditionally a hard time to gain donations, said Kristin Gross, assistant director of marketing for Inova Blood Donor Services. With regular donors going on vacation, children being out of school, and people's schedules being more hectic, potential donors are less likely to give blood. The problem is compounded on holidays, when even fewer people are in the area to give blood, she said.

"The need for blood never takes a holiday," said Gross. "Blood donors are needed all year round."

However, summertime donations to the local Red Cross are down even more this year than last year, Laubach said. In June of 2002, the local Red Cross collected 19,955 donations. This past June, the region collected only 15,738 donations ­ less than half of the ideal 1,300 units per day.

The Red Cross' regional blood shortage is a reflection of a national blood shortage, Laubach said. As a result, neighboring Red Cross regions cannot trade supplies to help one another. Laubach credits the severe decline with the fact that people simply assume everyone else is taking care of the problem.

Sometimes people are simply not aware of the problem, Gross said. While 60 percent of the general population is eligible to give blood, only 5 percent actually donates, she said.

"If more people knew of the need, we're hoping more people would come out and help out," she said.

Another reason donations are at a critical level is because of the higher restrictions the government has placed on donating blood, according to Gross. Since the onset of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, anyone who has traveled to an affected area may not donate for 14 days after returning to the United States. Individuals testing positive for SARS are deferred from donating blood until four weeks after completing treatment. Another new restriction prohibits people who test positive for West Nile virus from donating blood for 28 days.

The blood banks are trying to find new ways to convince people to donate blood. The American Red Cross has teamed up with the American Association of Blood Banks and America's Blood Centers to send a nationwide plea for donations. The American Red Cross has also instituted a cross-county tour aimed at educating the public and increasing blood donations.

Inova declares certain days to be Blood Alert Days, when critically low levels of donations are expected. Inova offers extra incentives during those days to help achieve the required 200 incoming units of blood per day. Most recently, the days in the week surrounding the Fourth of July were declared Blood Alert Days, and donors were offered patriotic T-shirts and birthday cake to celebrate the nation's birthday while giving blood.

All blood types are needed, though Gross noted that the demand for type O, the universal donor, was especially urgent for Inova.

"Right now, [stocked blood levels are] so low, you can literally walk into storage areas and the shelves are empty," said Laubach. "It's just not there. We definitely need people to step forward."