The local blood bank on Friday appealed to people to donate blood, saying stocks have dropped to a “very low level”.

The Hong Kong Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service said it only has four days’ worth of blood supplies, and called on people, especially those with blood types O, A and B, to give blood.

Blood collection department head Jennifer Leung said there are a number of reasons why the blood inventories are depleted.

“The recent weather had been unstable. There had been heavy rain… it made people more reluctant to go out and donate their blood,” Leung said.

"Also, plenty of people had been infected with upper respiratory diseases such as flu or Covid in the flu season earlier. If they had fever, they can only donate blood two weeks after recovering."

She urged donors to make prior bookings to shorten the waiting time.