HL Deb 25 February 2002 vol 631 cc192-3WA
Lord Morris of Manchester

asked Her Majesty's Government:

How many haemophilia patients, in the course of their National Health Service treatment, have to date received blood from donors who subsequently died of vCJD. [HL2861]

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath

No information is held centrally on the number of patients with haemophilia who received blood from donors who have since died from vCJ D.

Lord Morris of Manchester

asked Her Majesty's Government:

What screening test for vCJD is available to assure haemophilia patients that they are not being exposed to risk by the prescription of plasma and not recombinant products. [HL2862]

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath

There is no screening test available for vCJD. The Government are supporting a number of avenues of research into a diagnostic test for vCJD to enable a screening test to be developed for blood donations.

We have already taken action to reduce the theoretical risk of transferring vCJD through blood and blood products. As a precautionary measure all blood used for transfusion has had the white cells removed and we no longer use United Kingdom plasma in the manufacture of blood products.

£'000s
Resources Capital
Change New DEL Of which voted Non-voted Change New DEL Of which voted Non-voted
538,562 48,872,673 49,364,233 −491,560 −307,199 1,932,092 483,499 1,448,593

The change in the resource element of the DEL arises from the take-up of end year flexibility £120,000,000 for health authority allocations as set out in Table 6 of the Public Expenditure 2000–01 provisional outturn White Paper Cm 5243 published in July 2001: a claim of £30,000,000 on the reserve for variant CJD compensation; an additional £6,267,000 from HM Treasury as a result of technical adjustments following changes in accounting arrangements for some PFI schemes; a net transfer to the National Assembly for Wales of £2,493,000, £3,683,000 for out-of-area treatment costs, dental service increment for teaching, cross border flows and high security psychiatric services, partially offset by a transfer of £1,190,000 for regional re-costing and post-graduate education; transfers from Northern Ireland totalling £2,030,000, £68,000 for post-graduate training, £1,941,000 for out-of-area treatment costs and £21,000 (of which £7,000 administration costs) for contributions to committees and non-departmental public bodies; transfer to the Home Office of £1,569,000, £2,767,000 for drug action teams and match funded social care projects, offset by £1,098,000 for costs arising from the Victoria Climbie inquiry and £100,000 for medium secure units; a net transfer to the Department for Education and Skills of £613,000, comprising £750,000 for the National Institute of Psychiatry and £100,000 for a learning and development website package, offset by a transfer of £237,000 for the costs of Protection of Children Act tribunal and Care Standards tribunal; transfer to the Lord Chancellor's Department of £164,000, (of which £123,000 administration costs) for Care Standards tribunals and Family Health Services Appeals Authority recruitment; a transfer to the Department for Work and Pensions of £1,095,000 for the road traffic accidents work of the Compensation Recovery Unit; a transfer from the Department for Transport,