Have Type O Positive Blood? You Have Plenty Of Company
There are 30 or so different types of human blood, with Type O positive blood being one of them. In most countries in the world, O positive is the most common type, usually making up over a third of the population, with Type A positive in second place. Most of the blood types that have been discovered are rather rare, with 8 types being found in the vast majority the world's population. These 8 types are A+, A-, B+, B-, AB+, AB-, O+, and O-.
Let's Start With Some Blood Basics - It's of course O positive blood we're concerned with here, but to see just what O+ means, lets get back to some basics. As we all know, the blood is the medium which carries oxygen and other nutrients throughout our bodies to all the cells in our bodies, and also carries away wastes from those same cells. The blood has several components, but what we are concerned with here are the blood cells themselves, and also the plasma, the liquid component of the blood. Our blood cells may contain certain antigens, and the blood serum certain antibodies. Whatever antigens we have in our blood cells and whatever antibodies our blood serum contains, determines our blood type. Some people have certain antigens, others have other antigens. It's determined by heredity. Your parents chose your antigens, and your blood type, although they likely weren't aware of that.
A and B Are Not Good Friends - An antigen is defined as something that your immune system will normally try to destroy, by creating antibodies. You fight infections and other invasive things as foreign antigens are introduced into your system, and your immune system springs into action to destroy them. There are a few antigens however, that reside on the surface of your blood cells and are friendly, that is they "belong". Your immune system knows that, and will not create antibodies to destroy those cells. A person with Type A blood has A antigens in his or her blood cells, a person with Type B blood has B antigens. However, in the blood serum there are often antibodies which attack one or the other type of antigen. Those with Type A blood have antibodies in their blood serum which attack B antigens, and those with Type B blood have antibodies in their serum which attack A antigens. So a Type A person cannot receive blood from a Type B person, and vice versa.
Enter Type AB - It starts to get a little more confusing though as there is another blood group, called Type AB, which has both A and B antigens in the blood cells, but has no antibodies in the blood serum. That means a Type AB person can receive blood from either a type A or B individual, as there are no antibodies in Type AB blood to fight off the A or B antigens. The same person however, cannot donate blood to either group; as one group will fight of the A antigens and the other will fight off the B antigens, effectively destroying the entire blood cell. So where does type O come in? We'll get to that next and to Type O positive blood in a bit.
What's So Special About Type O? - Those with Type O blood have neither A nor B antigens in their blood cells, which means the Type O individual can donate blood to the other types. However, the Type O individual does have both A and B antibodies in the blood serum, so Types A, B, or AB cannot be donated to the Type O person, the antibodies will not accept any of these three blood types. If you are Type O, you can only accept a blood donation from another type O person. If you have Type O positive blood that is. A person having Type O negative blood can only accept blood from another Type O negative person, but that's the subject of another article. (continued...)
