The Lindsay Tribunal was told today that haemophiliacs were supplied with a blood product contaminated with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, ten months after it could have been made safe. Counsel for the Tribunal said the Blood Transfusion Service Board was supplying the product in untreated form until October 1985, even though similar foreign products were given anti-viral treatment from the beginning of that year.
John Finlay's opening statement took two hours to deliver and gave the first real insight into the issues which the Tribunal team feels are important. He said that they wanted to be particularly careful to guard against judging in hindsight. Mr Finlay said that it had also been difficult to establish certain facts as several key people in the BTS were now deceased. For example, he said that it was unclear as to what information the BTS sought from companies providing blood products about steps they were taking to reduce the risks of HIV contamination in the early 1980's.
However there were also clear areas of concern. Mr Finlay said that they wanted to establish why, once a process was established to eliminate HIV from one kind of blood product in 1985, the old product was still being used in 1986 which led to the infection of one identified person. He said that it was also unclear why a sub-test which could identify indicators of Hepatitis C and became available in 1987, that the BTS did not seek Ministerial approval for its introduction.
