Page 174 - The Miracle of the Blood and Heart

In the first blood transfusion ever performed, the patient
was given animal blood. The patient soon died, but nobody
could understand why.
When the blood of different animals proved useless, the
idea was born of transfusion from human being to human
being. Experiments were performed with individuals thought
to possess plenty of blood and who were selected at random.
Most of these experiments also ended in failure, however. The
first physicians engaged in blood transfusions were unable to
fully analyze and understand this important fluid, because of
two of its properties. One was the way that blood swiftly clots
outside the body, and the other was the likelihood of the person
to whom they gave the transfusion dying. 79 There had to be
some different factor in blood that the physicians were unable
to unravel. This factor was not discovered until the appearance
of the science of biochemistry.
th
Not until the early 20 century did scientists discover that
blood does not consist of a simple red fluid. Various factors may
make one person's blood different to another's. Therefore,
in order for blood transfusions to be given, these fac-
tors must be compatible in both parties. What we
refer to as blood type is the determination of these
Harun
Yahya

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