Posted on 03/03/2002 3:12:56 PM PST by adanaC
TV programmes about US blood companies
not to be viewed in public
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Friday, July 07 2000 |
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John Trainor, Senior Counsel for the Haemophilia Society, had made the application for the programmes to be viewed stating that they were "clearly relevant". He said that the Blood Transfusion Services committed an act of "irresponsible madness" when it continued to deal with the US company Travenol without having investigated the allegations after broadcast. Mr Trainor charged that it was "grossly irresponsible" that the Board of the BTS did not reconsider distributing the Travenol concentrated clotting agent. He said that the programmes had brought into the focus the need for Ireland to be self-sufficient in the production of blood supplies and accused the Board of "unforgivable" inactivity. Mr Trainor stated that the Haemophilia Society's ability to participate in the Tribunal would be "greatly hindered" if the programmes were not admitted in evidence. The application for a public viewing was opposed by Senior Counsel for the Tribunal, Mr Finlay. In her ruling, Judge Lindsay stated that she had viewed the programmes and considered the arguments, but decided against a public viewing. However, she ordered that transcripts of the programme be made available and said that the allegations could then be put to any witness. The World in Action programmes, two of which were transmitted as part of a series in 1975, investigated US blood companies, how they screed blood donors who were being paid for donations and the risk of blood products being infected with Hepatitis. |
Haemophiliac probably infected with HIV from clotting agent | Friday, July 14 2000 | |||
Dr Lawlor stated that she believed a clotting agent made by the firm 'Armour' and given to the haemophiliac at St James in Feb 1986 was most likely the source of his infection. She told the Tribunal that the BTS had earlier returned all of its Armour products to the company because Irish made concentrates, which were considered to be safer, were coming on stream. However Armour re-issued the product to St James' hospital and, in the view of Dr Lawlor, it was 'most likely' to have been the source of the HIV infection. Dr Lawlor agreed with John Trainor, Senior Counsel for the Irish Haemophilia Society that the destruction of 20 years of BTS dispatch records had made it more difficult to establish where the Armour batch had gone to. The Tribunal also heard extracts from two World In Action programmes, broadcast in 1975, which made serious allegations about a US blood firm and how it collected plasma to make blood products. The programmes which were entitled 'Blood Money' alleged to show how a division of the Baxter group did not apply its own donor screening procedures and increased the risks of hepatitis. Dr Lawlor stated that the risks of infection were known by the BTS, treating doctors and users but the benefits to haemophiliacs outweighed those considerations. She told the Tribunal that she would have put her own child on concentrates despite the known risks, because of what she termed 'the horror of untreated bleeds'. Dr Lawlor will return to the stand on Monday when she will be cross-examined by another party.
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> Yet, in two states, Arkansas and Louisiana, prison plasma programs persisted throughout the 1980s.
There were HMA collections at other prisons or, brokered, from the disreputable paid donations in slums and border towns. We have reason to believe that HMA operations spread rapidly through the dozen or so states where such plasma draws were legal.
All this was possible for one reason only: the plasma was in heavy demand. Prices stayed high. Panic over AIDS dried up old sources of blood in Haiti and Africa. New ones had to be found. Cummins Prison Farm alone produced a truckful of plasma every week -- up to a reputed 8,000 units. Angola Prison later did the same or a bit more. Inmates were bribed and bullied into donating plasma to the point of literally being bled white -- sometimes four units a week! (They were also cross-contaminated by dirty needles until they had a 100% hepatitis C rate and something near that for AIDS. Few of them are still alive.)
Who bought all this plasma at high prices? There's the $64 million question :-) It is known that some of it went to Connaught in Canada. But Connaught, the only Canadian processing facility, was old, creaky, inefficient and not very big. The U.S. had four processors, all of them newer and larger. They were prohibited by law from using prison blood. But SOMEBODY was buying all that plasma. Hmmm!
Jim Guy is a mean bleeper and a convicted criminal, but let's give him a break on this one. When Bubba left for Washington, D.C. (taking most of the Dixie Mafia with him), his crooked pals sold the Cummins blood concession to an out-of-state company. It ran two more years but we have no particular reason to think the new company did anything wrong. The market for prison plasma was almost dry by then anyway.
"In order to stabilize world population, it is necessary to eliminate 350,000 people a day. It is a horrible thing to say, but it's just as bad not to say it."
- Oceanographer Jaques Cousteau
Published in the Courier, a publication of
the United Nations Educational, Scientific
and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
great book! as good as anything by john grisham. would love to see the movie.
Me too, and I know the author is! It would make a terrific movie, so maybe the day will come.
Got the book, thanks to t'wit
change locale to, say, mittittippi or oklahoma?
call the former gov/pres "big guy" instead of bubba?
me too. mine's autographed! (by the author...not T'wit).
Those of us who have read it know it used fictional people instead of actual names. Some of us know the hell the author has gone through besides what is public knowledge.
Can you imagine what his life would have been like had he not used fictional names?
A movie would be top-notch!
He might now be in a place where he wouldn't have to worry about it.
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