Another Inquiry – Contaminated Blood Scandal

By

Hazel Speed

It seems as the decades emerge that there should be an independent power to whom individuals can take their reports, facts and/or suspicions concerning injustice, corruption or unethical matters.

How many Inquiries have we seen announced, rightfully so, but many have taken decades to achieve justice – such as Hillsborough.

This latest Inquiry (after the Grenfell Tower Fire) to be initiated, relates to contaminated blood supplies which have resulted (up to now), in the estimated deaths of at least 2,400 people, some of which include partners of those originally given the contaminated blood.

We are looking at the 1970s-1980s but, of course, the cause and effect will be continuous via offspring or others who may have been contaminated also. Children have lost a parent or parents needlessly, and all efforts to find out why they died, (or why they took ill) meet with a brick wall.

It amazes me why they had to purchase blood from abroad, as if an appeal for donors had been made in Britain, then I am sure any true Brit healthy enough to donate blood for free would have done so. Perhaps politically, in the relevant years, that would have been an embarrassment, yet this announcement goes beyond that!

Also, in the 1970s and 1980s, there was not the same technological facility, no doubt, to check the bought blood, in which case, yet another reason to ‘buy British’, as a patient’s health records could have been checked first.

Apparently, some donated blood came from prisoners in America who sell their blood for money. Another interpretation of blood money when one has to sell blood to make money, whoever they are, wherever they be.

Andy Burnham has claimed a huge cover up was put in place, as medical records were tampered with and/or altered so that it appeared any person contaminated died due to their ‘condition’ or ‘life style’. Fabricated or real facts in respect of those statements.

Mr Burnham, during a radio interview, said he personally knew of one person whose medical notes had falsified facts therein to suit the man’s death and which tarnished his real life style and reputation. The man’s widow asserts the real truth.

Haemophiliacs suffered as a group due to the contaminated blood, and of course some are within the number of those who died. Hopefully, blood supplies can be medically screened in this day and age.

Having said that, less than a year ago, I know of a true story where a doctor in a hospital was taking a blood sample from a patient and took a blooded piece of lint from a box of such samples, folded it over to find a portion of clean lint, and put it at the source of the point of the needle to catch any dripping blood.

According to what a nurse (not connected to the hospital) told this gentleman a few months later, even with the lint folded in half he ran the risk of getting a possible life-changing or terminal disease and should have refused.

Then again, the old man knew he would be a marked person if he complained, so just took the risk he would be okay. He was in a hospital which was known for bullying, and he had had his share of that.

Hazel Speed

Photo (c) Hazel Speed – used by kind permision to Tuck Magazine

Hazel Speed is a Philosopher, Writer, and Artist with various creative projects at differing stages of development. Her flaship project is an animation which has produced a film short: www.thepinkprofessor.com. She has also written an E-novel, ‘Just Suppose…!‘ which is available via the attached link.

Art sites: www.candystoreart.com, www.terrificart.com, www.artbadges.co.uk