On Saturday, 14 November 2026, Premier Gardens in Kigo will fill with the warmth of Soul, Jazz and R&B. Glasses will clink, conversations will deepen and strangers will become friends. The second edition of Heart & Soul Rendezvous is an elegant, invite-only gathering, but its purpose reaches well beyond the gardens, supporting the Mengo Hospital Rotary Blood Bank, and with it the work of collecting, screening and storing blood so that more patients can receive it when it matters most.
Ecobank is the Headline Sponsor of the second edition of Heart & Soul Rendezvous, supporting the gathering and its life-saving cause.
Most of us never think about blood until someone we love needs it. By the figures UBTS has shared, Uganda is projected to need about 450,000 units of blood a year but collects only about 300,000, leaving a gap of roughly 150,000 units. Other reports put the need nearer 400,000 units, which shows how stretched supply is under any estimate. The country uses about 1,000 units every day. That is a thousand moments daily in which a bag of blood stands between a family and its worst news.
The pressure comes from the most ordinary parts of life. Officials link surges in demand to road crashes, especially around the festive season, and to rising malaria cases among children and pregnant mothers. Behind each unit is a person, and often a very young or very vulnerable one.
Women with pregnancy-related complications account for about 30 percent of blood demand, and excessive bleeding is blamed for at least 41 percent of deaths among women in childbirth. Childbirth should be a celebration. Safe blood helps keep it one.
Children under five, fighting anaemia after severe malaria or malnutrition, need as much as half of the blood supply. The remaining 20 percent goes to surgical patients, trauma victims and people living with illnesses such as cancer and sickle cell disease. Each of them has a name, a family and a future that depends on a stranger’s decision.
The Gift of Giving
Voluntary blood donation is one of the few acts of generosity in which giver and receiver almost never meet. The donor will not see the mother who goes home with her newborn, or the child who runs again after weeks in a hospital bed. They give anyway.
It is also a gift that can be repeated. A man can safely donate up to four times a year, and a woman up to three. That is why the blood banks most need regular, committed donors. A single donation helps one patient, but a lifetime of giving can reach dozens.
The WHO guideline is that a country should collect blood equal to about 1 percent of its population. For Uganda, that means ordinary people, in large numbers, choosing to give.
The Mengo Hospital Rotary Blood Bank
The Mengo Hospital Rotary Blood Bank exists because people saw a need and refused to look away. A founder with a vision. A Rotary community that keeps standing behind the work. Medical professionals who see every day what reliable blood supply makes possible, and what its absence costs. And long-term voluntary donors, some of whom have given steadily for decades, who show that extraordinary impact does not require extraordinary means. It begins with one person deciding to give and then giving again.
Their voices will be at the heart of a documentary accompanying this year’s Rendezvous. It aims to answer the question every appeal must answer: Why does it matter?
An Afternoon with Purpose
Guests can expect soulful live music, meaningful conversation and the pleasure of good company. They will also be part of something larger, a community choosing to turn a beautiful afternoon into better odds for patients across Uganda.
Come for the music. Stay for the experience. Give for the lives we can save.
One gathering. One community. One life-changing cause.
