FIGURE Canada's new national blood agency might wish to examine a blood donor campaign launched in Berlin last year: it featured a blue blood said to be Count Dracula's last surviving descendant.
The count, whose full name is Ottomar Rudolphe Vlad Dracul Prince Kretzulesco, lives in a crumbling castle on the southern outskirts of the German capital. He agreed to help the Red Cross after Germany's health minister appealed for more donors in an attempt to replenish dwindling national stocks.
Noting that supplies were so low that all nonurgent operations had been put on hold, the minister appealed to all Germans between 18 and 68 to donate blood or plasma. The Count helped the campaign by attending special showings of vampire movies for blood donors. All those who gave blood received his autograph.
The Count is the last descendant of the bloodthirsty Romanian prince named Vlad the Impaler, who some consider the inspiration for Irish novelist Bram Stoker's 1897 gothic horror fantasy, Dracula.