Lubumbashi, February 11th, 2026 (CPA).-The role of blood types has been explained on Wednesday to the population of Lubumbashi, main city of the province Haut-Katanga in the south-east of the Democratic Republic of Congo, by a reproductive health researcher during an interview. « The four blood types allow us to categorise people according to their blood. Thus, group A are people who have appropriate antibodies that do not allow those in group B to receive them and vice versa, and blood group AB develop antibodies against A and B and cannot receive either A or B,‘ has declared Dr Philippe Mukuna, a doctor at the ambulatory clinic ‘Health for All’ and a reproductive health researcher. According to him, people in group O do not develop any antibodies against groups A, B or AB. « As for the Rhesus factor (the surface of the red blood cell), we can find the presence of antigens. If a red blood cell has antigens, we say it is positive, which means that someone can be group A, B, AB, and O positive, meaning that there are antigens on its surface, while someone who does not have antigens on the surface of their red blood cells is said to be negative, which is why we have A negative, B negative, AB negative, and O negative, » he has said.
The roles of haemoglobin in the blood
Mr Mukuna has explained that haemoglobin is a protein found inside red blood cells and has multiple roles. « This protein has several roles. It contains iron, which means that thanks to this protein, there is a part called haem, which binds iron and makes the blood red. This is the colour of haemoglobin. Its second role is to transport oxygen to the lungs, circulating oxygen throughout the human body, » he has explained. This doctor has emphasised that the way haemoglobin transports oxygen in the body is comparable to the process that occurs when blood leaves the heart and travels to the lungs to take up oxygen.