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So the story of BOAT by LifeBank began 2 years ago. A clinic called us in a panic. Someone needed 5 pints of blood. We found the pints in our database and our MD Rider was already at the blood bank, then they called that they only need 2 bags so we adjusted and delivered.
55 minutes later, we dropped the blood, and they were relieved, but they told us the patients family decided on just 2 pints because of costs and now the patient definitely needs more. The MD Rider went back to the blood bank but before he got there, the man had died.
His story stayed with me. I couldn’t help at the time because I needed to prove the LifeBank model, but I knew I was going to do something about it. #BOATbyLIfeBank
then came another and another and another. People calling begging for our help. Mother in laws calling. Moms calling for their children. Men calling for their wives. Grown men crying because they couldn’t afford blood. We always tried to help but we weren’t related to Dangote!
Then came @seunonigbinde’s tweet about a man he met in a hospital lobby. A problem I had been stressing about now became public. We held a meeting with the team and started plotting! How do we do ensure every Nigerian has access to blood and oxygen! We came up with Blood Trust!
We then partnered with @theflutterwave and went halfsies on a small pilot fund to test out our assumptions! We worked with the Dorcas Childhood Cancer Foundation and @LUTHofficial to figure some things out and we learnt a whole lot! 
We learnt 4 things! 1. Radical transparency is essential in a low trust environment. So we built a paltform that will update partners in real time. 2. We need the medical team to let us know who really can’t afford these things to reduce fraud. #BOATbyLIfeBank
3. We learnt that we need to raise a bigger fund for this to work mainly because these products aren’t cheap at all and there are a whole lot of poor people in our country!
And finally we learnt that we need to deploy private and corporate capital! I have always believed that businesses want to give back more but no one has done it in a way that builds trust!
BOAT by LifeBank is a simple product. It is a fund and a paltform to transform healthcare using philanthropy and ensure universal access to blood and oxygen!
We’ve partnered with @Renmoney for our inaugural fund! And we cannot wait to announce new partners! This amount will help about 30 patients! How cool is that? We are so excited! #BOATbyLIfeBank
We’ve launched a website and will launch the platform soon. But first, we need doctors! We need nurses and frontline health workers!
We need your help! We need you to tell all the doctors and nurses in your life about BOAT. If you know any doctor or nurses who care about their patients, please tell them about BOAT! We want to sign up 10,000 medical partners as soon as possible! Please RT! Let’s save lives!
