Contaminated blood victims said they are living with survivor’s guilt as their lives “continue to be blighted” by the lasting effects of the worst scandal in NHS history. The Infected Blood Inquiry has laid bare the scale of the failings within the NHS which left tens of thousands of people in the UK infected with deadly viruses . Between the 1970s and early 1990s, patients were given contaminated blood and blood products.
This includes people who needed blood transfusions for accidents, in surgery or during childbirth, and patients with certain blood disorders who were treated with donated blood plasma products or blood transfusions. Some 3,000 people have died and others have been left with lifelong health complications after being infected with viruses including hepatitis C and HIV . Here are some of the victims and campaigners who have spoken out ahead of the final report.
Former pupils of a boarding school where boys with haemophilia were infected with contaminated blood have said they were told to “carry on as normal” as their peers became sick. More than half of the boys treated for haemophilia at Lord Mayor Treloar College between the 1970s and 1980s are now dead. Several pupils who attended the boarding school in Hampshire in the 1970s and 1980s were given treatment for haemophilia at an on-site NHS centre while receiving their education.
A grieving sister has described how her brother “absolutely loved” the school would have been devastated to see the .