§ Lord Morris of Manchesterasked Her Majesty's Government:
How many people the Department of Health have warned that they may be at increased risk of developing vCJD as a result of National Health Service treatment; to how many haemophilia patients the warning has been sent; and how many such patients have already been infected with hepatitis C by contaminated National Health Service blood products. [HL4357]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord Warner)In England, 15 recipients of whole blood products were notified in December 2003 of their possible increased risk of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.
For recipients of plasma products, the patient notification exercise was started on 21 September, and is still in progress. For people with haemophilia, patient records need to be examined to see which plasma products they have received since 1980. Clinicians treating these patients are currently examining records for around 6,000 people. This will take some time to complete. There are no data available yet on how many of those people have been notified.
101WAIt is estimated that there are currently about 3,000 people with haemophilia who are infected with hepatitis C through contaminated blood and blood products.
For people outside this group, individual risk assessments need to be completed once patients have been identified as being a recipient of an affected product. Trusts are working with the Health Protection Agency to trace recipients and complete risk assessments. This exercise is expected to take several months. There are no data available yet on numbers of people who may need to be notified.