am posting here to ask that you take part in a campaign I have started, to set up a national blood bank for dogs and cats in the UK

A strange request you ask, but this affects me personally..
We recently lost our gorgeous spollie (springer spanial/collie X) Slick to a very severe form of canine anaemia.
The treatment he was being given for this horrible disease involved very strong steroid treatment (4 - 6 months), which he was taking in conjunction with very frequent blood transfusions.
For the initial transfusion, our vet was able to contact the owner of one of their "doggy donors" to arrange for the blood to be taken. But, as this was to be a long term situation, our vet asked that we source the blood ourselves, as the "doggy donors" they had on their list were limited in numbers, and may be required for other dogs (a dog can only donate blood once every 3 months, as they need sufficient time to recover)
For you and I, if we have an operation/are in an accident etc, there is blood stored by the national blood service that can be called upon for your use.
Despite having been petitioned on several occasions by the PDSA, DEFRA have decided that the equivalent can not be set up for "non-food animals" and so every time Slick needed a transfusion we had to go through the rigmarole of sourcing the blood ourselves..

Recently a national register of owner details has gone on-line www.dogblooddonors.com , but as it is in its infancy, there were no dogs on there that could have helped Slick at this time

I have set up a petition that has the desired outcome that a national blood bank is set up in the UK for non-food animals. I ask you to sign this petition and send it on to as many people as you can think of. I will be presenting this to the Minister for Animal Welfare at the end of February 2007

link to petition http://www.petitionthem.com/default....etail&pet=3600
This I hope will leave something in place as a legacy to a much loved family member that fought as best he might
Thank you for your time
Sam Beavis