Public Inquiry into Hepatitis C blood products demanded
14/04/06
Fresh call have been made for a public inquiry into the Scottish authorities? handling of people who contracted hepatitis C from blood products in the 1970s and 1980s.
Frank Maguire of Thompsons Scotland stated that information gathered through the Freedom of Information Act showed that some patients have had to wait up to 20 years before finding out they'd been infected.
Blood testing for hepatitis C first became available in 1991.
But having studied documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, solicitor-advocate Frank Maguire says the blood transfusion service relied on ?pure chance? to find and advise patients who may have been at risk before then.
He represents over 100 patients demanding a public enquiry into how many of them contracted the condition through contaminated blood products.
Andy Gunn from Inverness was infected with hepatitis C and HIV along with hundreds of other haemophiliacs during the late 1980s and 1990s.
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