When Alison Holt's father got cancer he needed life-saving blood transfusions as part of his treatment.
Struck by feelings of helplessness, she received a small measure of comfort as a regular blood donor, feeling like she was giving him the blood he needed to continue his fight.
"You just know it's so important, and it's that old thing of 'when you need it you want it to be there'. I think it's just so, so important," she said.
Mrs Holt gave blood for the first time in her native South Africa as an 18-year-old.
She has lived in Australia the past 24 years and had donated more than 50 times when the Australian Red Cross closed its Kalgoorlie blood donor centre in 2013.
Amid a new push to reopen the Kalgoorlie centre, Mrs Holt said she would be the first one in line to give blood again.
"It was just a good feeling being able to give back to the community by giving blood," she said.
"There was so much support for it here and when it did leave our only choice was Perth.
"I used to persuade my husband to donate. There was word of mouth and mining companies would get involved.
"I just think it would be an amazing thing [to get it back] and people are very keen to donate."
Beers for blood
Similarly, life-long Goldfields resident Doug Daws was a regular blood donor.
He recalled how in the 1980s, prior to the closure of Kalgoorlie's famous Hannans Brewery, donors would receive free beer as a reward for giving blood.
"They liked to keep an eye on you for a few minutes after the donation, just to make sure you're not going to jump in the car and faint," Mr Daws said.
"These days you might get a cup of tea, but when I first started donating, the Hannans Brewery used to offer you a glass of beer.
"The nursing sister would knock the top off a long brown and pour out a beer, and then send you back onto the street.
"It probably resulted in a few extra donations."
'Feel good' push: MP
Bunbury and Albany are the only locations in regional WA with blood donor centres.
Kalgoorlie MLA Ali Kent has been lobbying for its return and put her case to officials from the Australian Red Cross' Lifeblood service last month.
"The people I'm dealing with at Lifeblood, they had told me prior to COVID that the supplies were good in Kalgoorlie and they didn't need any supplies," the Labor MP said.
"But the conversation and the rhetoric has changed since then in terms of them looking at the community expectation about donating blood.
"They recognise now that it's a really big, feel-good thing for people in the community to give back and donate their blood.
"In the Goldfields we see in the media all the time that Perth is lacking in certain blood types and they're encouraging people to donate, and I've got people banging down my door saying 'we really want to donate blood'."
Despite her lobbying, Ms Kent was adamant it was a federal government responsibility to fund the service, rather than the state government.
Mr Daws said the mining industry would jump at the opportunity to fund the service, similar to Rio Tinto's long-running arrangement with the Royal Flying Doctor Service.
"If it's a question of funding a couple of phone calls to our mining mates and we could have this sorted," he said.
Kalgoorlie resident Nick Fardell has also joined the campaign to restore the service, shining a light on the cause as he battles blood cancer and receives regular transfusions.
400 donor locations nationwide
The Australian Red Cross' Lifeblood service told the ABC in a statement it routinely reviews its national network plan to "best meet the needs of patients", but says it is "not possible to be everywhere".
Lifeblood collects blood in more than 400 locations nationwide and has four processing centres around the country, including Perth, where it is tested and processed before being distributed to hospitals.
"For WA, this means all hospitals across the state receive their blood via Perth, regardless of where in the country it's donated," Lifeblood said in a statement.
"For instance, blood collected in Bunbury would be sent to our processing centre in Perth and may then be distributed to a hospital in Geraldton."
Lifeblood said 2,000 appointments need to be filled at its WA donor centres each fortnight.
"We receive hundreds of requests each year from across the country to collect blood in new, or old, locations like Kalgoorlie," the statement said.
"Decisions around new centre or mobile locations are based on a number of factors including proximity to our processing centres, population size, estimated donation rate, and availability of qualified staff.
"Australia is a vast country and while we'd love to collect blood in more communities, [but] it's not possible to be everywhere."
Lifeblood opened two new donor centres in Victoria last year and a third is due to open at the Sydney Swans' AFL complex in July.
