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Leading activists said the contaminated blood scandal would never have happened if authorities had heated up medical products to prevent possible infection.
The Infected Blood Inquiry, set up in 2017 to investigate the biggest scandal in NHS history, will publish its final report on Monday. It is hoped that this will show that authorities and doctors knew how to protect patients when administering blood products, but chose to ignore basic medical practice. There is.
Blood products were given to more than 30,000 people in the UK between 1970 and the early 1990s on the NHS, including drug users, prisoners and prostitutes infected with HIV and hepatitis C.
Two groups were affected: hemophiliacs who were given clotting factors that are not present in their blood (called factor VIII and factor IX, which are produced from donated human plasma); People who received contaminated blood transfusions after childbirth or treatment. More than 3,000 people have died, and many more have suffered from the debilitating disease for decades.
The investigation will shed light on who is responsible for the scandal, which comes amid allegations of a decades-long cover-up by the NHS. We heard evidence that another plasma-derived blood product used to treat burns, called albumin, had been heat-treated since the 40s, specifically to kill hepatitis.
It was not until 1985 that all factor VIII products were heat treated to kill the HIV virus, and blood donations in the UK were not routinely tested for hepatitis C until 1991. It was.
Jason Evans, director and founder of campaign group Factor 8, said: I: “The core finding that we expect to see in the report is that factor concentrates should never have been introduced unless and until heated. Heat is C It’s important because it kills hepatitis and HIV, and if the product had been heated in the first place, this scandal would never have happened. No one who received the factor VIII product would have been infected.”
In the early 70s, Britain had not achieved self-sufficiency in blood donations. This meant that the government had to look elsewhere to ensure the supply of blood and related products to meet increasing demand. The NHS started using foreign supplies from the US because they were cheaper. No whole blood was imported, but a large amount of factor VIII was imported.
In 1953, the World Health Organization warned that plasma products should be produced in fewer than 10 donations because of the increased risk of hepatitis C. However, in the 70’s, factor VIII was manufactured in tens of thousands of donations.
Mr Evans said: “Knowledge about heating blood products to prevent deadly infections and recommendations regarding the maximum number of blood donors go back a very long time and completely blow away the old covert tendencies of self-sufficiency, and these This became more prominent in the 1970s. I think that’s going to be the key finding from the evidence, and that’s what we’re hoping for. ”
The government has already announced that both surviving victims and relatives of the deceased will receive significant compensation through the newly established Infected Blood Compensation Authority. The Treasury has reportedly already set aside “more than £10 billion” in a compensation package that also has support from Labor.
He spoke in response to the announcement, prior to the release of the report’s findings. IJeremy Hunt, who will announce the government’s compensation package, said in an interview: Sunday Times “This is the worst scandal of my lifetime, the worst scandal of my political career,” he said.
“I think the family has a right to be incredibly angry that generations of politicians, including myself as Health Secretary, have not acted swiftly on this scandal,” he added. .
“Rishi Sunak and I both believe the delay has been too long. The time for justice is now.”
Inquiry chair Sir Brian Langstaff said in an interim report to be published in 2022 that compensation should be paid “without delay”. Ministers have made initial payments of £100,000 each to around 4,000 victims and some surviving partners, and ministers will later set out compensation amounts. This week after publication of the final report.
Rachel Halford, CEO of the Hepatitis C Trust, said: We hope Monday’s report marks the beginning of the end of this long movement for justice for all those affected by infected blood and blood products.
“The government must now implement all the recommendations of the commission, which have been known for more than a year. Compensation must be extended to everyone affected, including those infected through blood transfusions and all parents who watched their children die as a result of this horrific scandal.
“They need to announce a clear timeline for when these compensation payments will be made. Justice delayed is justice denied and sadly thousands of people who received infected blood or blood products Thousands of people will not live until tomorrow’s report is published. The Government must act quickly to avoid further delays in this process.”
Des Collins, senior partner at Collins Solicitors and legal adviser to more than 1,500 victims, said Monday would be a “day of truth” for thousands of people.
“What the twice-delayed final investigation report means for this community is almost impossible to explain,” he said.
“They will finally realize everything they went through and learn as a public record how and why the infected blood scandal happened. The consequences will no doubt be even more painful as they come after years of denying, obfuscating and flatly refusing to acknowledge the mistakes made at the individual, organizational and governmental level. .
“While we fully expect that some people will find this report unpleasant to read, we hope that this report will help governments, civil servants, NHS clinicians and others learn from the mistakes they have made. “We hope that this will help ensure that something as large as the infected blood scandal never happens again.” “
Mr Evans, from Coventry, was four years old when his father Jonathan died after contracting HIV and hepatitis C at the Oxford Haemophilia Centre. He said that before the scandal, “life didn’t exist” because his first memory of his father was when he died of AIDS. Evans founded the Factor 8 campaign group in 2016 because he “couldn’t let this go.”
Asked on Monday after the report’s release whether he felt like a victory, Evans said: It’s already too late. Too many people died. No matter what happens, nothing can bring my father back. It’s really sad because there’s nothing to remind us of the many other people who died. For so many, this story does not have a happy or satisfying ending. What happened is it’s just not available.
“But in the sense that you get depressed, just like you have to get up every day to look for documents, file Freedom of Information requests, write letters to ministers and officials, collect signatures on petitions. I think there can be some sort of psychological closure.” And then there’s more.
“It would be a huge relief, not just for me, but for a lot of people who have been campaigning on this issue, to wake up and not have to do that anymore. And I have a 15-month-old daughter that I would like to spend more time with. That would be great.”