Uganda, March 6 -- Health researchers said patients who do not require blood transfusion and those not tested to determine their need, are being transfused in hospitals, a vice they warn may endanger patients' lives and waste the scarce resource.

Uganda is currently collecting around 320,000 units of blood annually, an amount, which the Health Ministry says is 30 percent below the estimated requirement of 450,000 units for managing patients who require it.

"Sometimes health workers are transfusing unnecessarily," Dr Aggrey Dhabangi, a transfusion physician and lecturer at Makerere University Medical School said in an interview on Monday in Kampala. "If you are anemic you can die so, we sometimes give you blood, but a blood transfusion i...