- Thousands of people who have received blood transfusions
over the last two decades are to be banned from giving blood because of
fears that they could transmit vCJD, the human form of BSE.
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- John Reid, the Health Secretary, said the ban was a precautionary
measure to avoid the "slight risk" of transmission of the disease
after a suspected case of a patient who was thought to have caught vCJD
from a transfusion. About 52,000 donors will be excluded from the 1.7 million
who regularly give blood. Mr Reid said the move would "inevitably
lead to a reduction in the supply of blood available for transfusions".
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- The case that led to the ban was announced in December
and involved a patient who died of vCJD last autumn. The patient is believed
to have acquired the disease after a blood transfusion in 1996 from a donor
who later developed vCJD.
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- The donor died in 1999, confirming doctors' fears that
the incurable brain disease, which can be passed to humans through consumption
of BSE-infected cattle, could also be transmitted through blood. The donor
had shown no sign of infection at the time of the donation.
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- Experts said at the time that a coincidence could not
be ruled out, but the chances of the donor and recipient independently
falling victim to the brain disease were remote. Mr Reid insisted yesterday
that this was still a "possibility, not a proven causal connection".
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- Fifteen other people who received blood from donors and
later developed vCJD had been identified and contacted, a Health Department
spokesman said. The risks had been explained to them and they had been
offered counselling.
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- There are potentially thousands more people who have
been treated with blood plasma products and could face a much smaller risk.
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- The spokesman said that everyone who had ever eaten beef
was at potential risk of developing vCJD but people who had received blood
transfusions had an additional potential source of infection.
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- One of the unanswered questions is how long a person
could be infectious and capable of passing on the disease before symptoms
develop. There is no screening test for vCJD but post-mortem examinations
have revealed signs of the disease in body tissues such as tonsils and
appendixes several years before symptoms started.
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- Announcing the ban in the Commons, Mr Reid told MPs that
the Government was following a "highly precautionary" approach.
He said: "Although people may have concerns about the implications
of this announcement, I would emphasise again that this action is being
taken because of an uncertain but slight risk.
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- "People should, indeed, continue to have a blood
transfusion when it is really necessary. Any slight risk associated with
receiving blood must be balanced against the significant risk of not receiving
that blood when it is most needed."
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- The ban would apply to anyone who received a transfusion
after January 1980 because it was "generally accepted that there would
have been no exposure to BSE in the UK before that date", Mr Reid
said. He urged people able to donate blood to continue to do so.
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- Measures will be put in place to help compensate for
the thousands of banned donors. Mr Reid said transfusions should only be
done where there was a "clear clinical need".
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- Some experts called for more radical action. Sheila Bird,
a professor of statistics at the Medical Research Council at Cambridge,
said tonsils removed in operations and post- mortem examinations should
be tested for traces of abnormal prions so checks could be made on whether
people had given blood and instruments used in surgery could be destroyed.
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- She said: "Banning people who have had transfusions
from becoming blood donors is an important first step but it is not the
only thing we can do."
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- © 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd
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- http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/health/story.jsp?story=501975
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