Blood agony drove me to the brink of suicide
Victim tells inquiry of alcohol and depression battle
A HAEMOPHILIAC was driven to depression and alcoholism after infected blood products left him with hepatitis C, an inquiry heard yesterday.
William Wright had been given Factor VIII, a protein essential to blood clotting, by his doctor after suffering a thigh injury.
But the 60-year-old said the consultant failed to make him aware of the risks associated with the treatment or the severity of hepatitis as a disease.
Mr Wright, of Perth, was giving evidence at the Edinburgh inquiry into the NHS’s use of contaminated blood products during the 1970s and 1980s.
Thousands of patients were infected with HIV and hepatitis C via contaminated blood products and 2,400 people died.
The scandal has been labelled the worst treatment disaster in the history of the NHS.
Now chairman of Haemophilia Scotland, Mr Wright has been campaigning on the issue for 20 years following his own hepatitis C diagnosis.
In an impassioned address to the inquiry, which received a standing ovation, Mr Wright urged Government officials to examine their consciences and implored them to act ‘with humanity and compassion’ towards those affected by the scandal.
He said: ‘The people I am really standing up for are the people the camera can’t see.
‘I look around this room and I see the woman who has lost her father, a couple of men who could have had a real working life. I see parents who have devoted their life to the care of their son.’
Treatment for Mr Wright’s hepatitis C left him with scarring on the liver and chronic fatigue, forcing him to retire on medical grounds at the age of 41. He told the inquiry it had left him ‘always wondering’ what he might have achieved.
Mr Wright also detailed his struggle with depression and alcoholism after multiple treatments to cure his infection failed. He said he fell into a ‘deep depression, to the point of being actively suicidal’.
His poor mental health led to alcohol addiction and ‘a whole series of terrible events that I feel ashamed about, I feel guilty about and I will regret to the day I die’.
Mr Wright’s wife Rosemary also spoke about the impact of her husband’s ordeal, saying at one point in their lives they could not plan more than three months ahead.
She became emotional as she described the ‘years of anxiety, uncertainty and fear’ and the toll of having to pick up the slack for her family, emotionally and financially.
She said: ‘I want people to move on. Maybe I can’t turn the clock back but there’s too many years that people were ignored and successive governments did nothing.’
The inquiry continues.
‘Terrible events I feel ashamed about’