Why Is AB Blood Type So Rare? It’s All About The Red Blood Cells. If you found out you're type AB, you're pretty unique, in fact, you have the rarest blood type of all. So why are so few people categorized as AB? Click here to know why!
You’ve probably donated blood at least once in your life so, along with free apple juice, the American Red Cross gave you a card identifying your blood type. If you found out you're type AB, you're pretty unique, in fact, you have the rarest blood type of all. So why are so few people categorized as AB? “We inherit our blood groups on genes,” Dr. Leslie Silberstein, a spokesperson for the American Society of Hematology and hematologist at Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Stem Cell Institute, toldMedical Daily. “The blood group gene encodes for a protein that gets expressed on the surface of the red cell and that is what we detect in the laboratory. So what is expressed on the surface of the cell determines the type and which blood is compatible with which patient.” Let’s take a step back to refresh the basics. All blood contains the samebasic components: red cells, white cells, platelets, and plasma, which is the liquid portion of blood holding the red and white blood c...