MPs to debate ‘criminal cover-up’ in contaminated blood scandal

PARLIAMENT is to hold an emergency debate on the contaminated blood scandal today on the back of damning new evidence from the Daily Mail. Commons Speaker John Bercow granted the debate after MPs said the Government needed to examine potential criminal activity. An estimated ,400 people died with hepatitis and HIV after they received tainted blood clotting agents in the 1970s and 1980s.

Minutes of papers seen by the Mail suggest health officials knew in 1980 and 1981 that patients were falling sick.

Yet it was not until 1986 that supply of the contaminated blood stopped.

Diana Johnson, Labour MP for Hull North, demanded a public inquiry in light of the documents. Her call has been backed by politicians from the Conservative and Labour parties, victims, lawyers and patient groups. Miss Johnson said the scandal was the worst treatment disaster in the history of the NHS. She added: ‘Last week the Daily Mail set out evidence that as early as 1980 officials knew that 50 people with haemophilia a year were being infected with hepatitis C. Nothing was done about this for five years.’

The UK imported supplies of the clotting agent Factor VIII from the US, some of which turned out to be infected. Much of the plasma used to make the products came from donors including prison inmates, who had sold their blood.

A joint letter from the six opposition leaders at Westminster said a fresh probe should look into allegations of a cover-up and claims that patients were not told of the risks, even after the dangers became clear.