An official report on Britain’s socialized National Health Service (NHS) infecting thousands of people with diseases, including HIV and hepatitis, has finally been released.
Starting in the 1970s and into the early 1990s, the socialized healthcare provider treated accident victims, mothers who had recently given birth, hemophiliacs, and others with factor concentrate. This blood product was pooled from blood plasma concentrated from potentially thousands of donors.
The fact that the products, often imported from the U.S. under the names Factor VIII and Factor IX, drew on so many donors greatly increased their chances of being tainted with disease. This risk was elevated by a reliance on U.S. drug addicts and prisoners who were paid to donate and a lack of testing.
By 1983, it was already apparent people were being infected. Infectious disease expert Dr Spence Galbraith asked for U.S. blood products to be withdrawn until issues with HIV infection were better understood. He was ignored. The NHS did not even begin heat-treating blood products to reduce the risk of infections until 1985,
The chairman of the Infected Blood Inquiry, former judge Sir Brian Langstaff, described the scandal as “horrifying.” He confirmed the government and health authorities engaged in “downright deception” in an effort to cover-up it up, including the destruction of documents.
“This disaster was not an accident. The infections happened because those in authority — doctors, the blood services and successive governments — did not put patient safety first,” he stated.
Langstaff’s inquiry, which has taken five years, was only authorized in 2017. H said it was hampered by “institutional defensiveness” on the part of the NHS and government, as well as the passage of time. Many relevant persons died before it began working, or managed to claim they were too old to give evidence.
‘GASLIT FOR GENERATIONS.’
“We’ve been gaslit for generations and this report today brings an end to that,” said Sue Wathen of the Tainted Blood campaign, welcoming the inquiry’s findings.
Of over 30,000 people believed to have been infected by the NHS, almost 400 were children. Many of them died either before or shortly after reaching adulthood. Around 3,000 people died overall, without ever being compensated.
Interim compensation payments of just £100,000 (~$127,000) have already been made to around 4,000 infected patients and surviving family members. However, no current or former government or health officials have been prosecuted.
