WHO and K‑pop group ENHYPEN rally global blood‑donation pledges

In June, the World Health Organization teamed with South Korean pop group ENHYPEN for its World Blood Donor Day activities. The collaboration blended the band’s music, videos and social‑media posts with WHO’s message about voluntary, unpaid blood donation. ENHYPEN’s global fan community, ENGENE, helped spread the campaign, which the WHO director‑general said reached millions of people worldwide. By meeting the band in Korea, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus highlighted how the partnership leveraged the group’s popularity to amplify a public‑health call to action.

The Drop Your Drop initiative recorded more than 9,000 pledges to donate blood from individuals in 177 countries. Among those, over 3,250 ENHYPEN fans pledged to give blood, showing the concrete impact of the fan‑driven outreach. WHO stresses that each pledge represents a potential donor for the global blood supply, reinforcing the organization’s emphasis on voluntary, unpaid donations as a cornerstone of safe transfusion services. The breadth of the response illustrates how a culturally resonant campaign can mobilise participants across a wide geographic spectrum.

During the campaign, ENHYPEN members visited a local Red Cross centre in Korea and donated blood themselves, providing a visible example for their supporters. Tedros praised the band’s commitment, noting that their involvement helped raise awareness and encourage others to donate. The combination of personal action by the artists and the digital promotion by ENGENE created a multi‑layered message that linked music, celebrity influence and a concrete health need, reinforcing WHO’s call for broader participation in blood donation.