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      The  following sections are excerpts from  "The  Blood
Conspiracy" by Joleen Swain Ottosen.  The book is an  expose
of  the  blood  industry and health bureaucracy.   AIDS  and
hepatitis tests still allow some infected blood donations to
slip  through undetected.  And during the past  four  years,
blood banks have reported causing over 30,000 accidents  and
errors.  In 1993, the FDA sued the American Red Cross for  a
five-year  failure to correct blood safety violations  on  a
national level.
     The Blood Conspiracy is also a well-documented story of
a  family  that  received  not  one,  but  two  AIDS-tainted
transfusions.  Millions of hepatitis infections and tens  of
thousands of AIDS infections have been given to Americans by
a  blood  supply  they  were assured was  safe.   The  Swain
family's   high-risk  behavior  for  contracting  AIDS   was
believing safe-blood propaganda.
     At the end of the excerpts, health consumers are warned
that today's transfusion climate is one of "patient beware".
A   free  report  on  the  numerous  ways  patients  can  be
transfused  with  their  own  safe  blood  is  available  on
request.

-----

      I  sat  at my father's funeral listening to a  quartet
sing,  "Not  now  but in the coming years .  .  .  Sometime,
sometime  we'll understand. "I knew it would take  years  of
investigation to uncover the truth surrounding the events of
his  death.  It  would  be  a long time  before  our  family
"understood".
      My  thoughts riveted on that fateful day three  and  a
half  years  before January 4, 1985the day Dad  received  18
units  of blood during coronary bypass surgery in Salt  Lake
City,  Utah. Now at age 79 he was gonenot a victim of  heart
disease but of transfusion AIDS. Orville Swain died  on  the
4th  of July, 1988. It seemed appropriate that as the nation
he  loved celebrated its independence, he had finally gained
his freedom from those horrible years of suffering.
      I tried not to think of my father's wasted body and to
remember happier times. They seemed so long ago, crowded out
by  the  dreadful  happenings of the past several  years.  I
fought back tears as I remembered my mother's AIDS infection
and  subsequent  death  just 11 months  beforea  death  that
mercifully had not been so long in coming, but one that  was
caused by the blood bank's callous irresponsibility.
      Blood  bank  officials had learned five  months  after
Dad's surgery that one of his donors carried the AIDS virus.
But  they chose to conceal this information. They knew  that
he  was old and in poor health after major heart surgery and
expected  him to soon die. They were confident their  secret
would be buried with him.
      As a result of the blood bank's deadly silence, Mother
was  later  sexually infected with AIDS. Even after  doctors
diagnosed  my father's AIDS-related illness 25 months  after
his surgery, the coverup continued. The family was still not
told. Children and grandchildren were unknowingly exposed to
HIV-infected blood and bodily fluids as they cared  for  the
couple without taking precautions.
      I  listened to the eulogy. As the speaker mentioned my
father's surviving brothers and sisters, my mind lingered on
Darreld,  his  youngest brother who was the  grandfather  of
another  victim of transfusion AIDS. 'How painful this  must
be for him' I thought. Six months after Dad's heart surgery,
Darreld visited my parents, distraught over his two-year-old
grandson's recent diagnosis of AIDS.
      Little Jonathan Swain had contracted the virus from  a
tainted blood transfusion given after his birth in a  Denver
hospital.  As my uncle talked about his grandson's  tragedy,
Dad  lay on the couch exhausted from the unexplained illness
that had dogged him since his surgery. It is incredible that
none of us recognized the transfusion connection between Dad
and Jonathan's ill health.
     Nonprofit blood banking is unique. It is a big business
receiving  free  labor from volunteers and free  advertising
from the news media. Altruistic blood donors provide its raw
product  in  exchange for a glass of juice and a  couple  of
crackers.  Because  nonprofit blood enterprises  operate  as
local monopolies, they seldom have any competition. They pay
no state or federal income tax and are essentially protected
from  lawsuits.  Most people don't realize that  this  large
billion-dollar  "nonprofit" industry  is,  in  fact,  highly
profitablewith greater profit margins than America's largest
corporations!  Blood  banks enjoy the  image  of  charitable
organizations. They are the revered institutions that supply
the  lifesaving gift of blood. Unfortunately, a  transfusion
that saves a life may later take that life.



      Orvin's fury had been building for over a week. Now he
raged  around  the hospital like Satan with a toothache.  He
found  Madsen  and told him he was taking Dad  to  the  Holy
Cross Hospital.
      Seeing how resolute Orvin was, Madsen did one  of  his
about-faces,  this time on the availability of  Pentamidine.
"It  isn't necessary to take him to Salt Lake," he said.  "I
can get the drug for PCP and treat him right here."
      "Then why did you tell us you couldn't get it and  let
him  get  within an inch of death?" Orvin yelled. "I've  had
enough of this bullshit. I'm taking him out of here."
      Madsen tried another approach. The previous day  Dad's
right  leg  had  become  swollen  and  painful.  Tests   had
indicated he had two blood clots in the veins of his leg.
      "You  can't  move  him," the doctor  said.  "It's  too
dangerous. The ambulance ride could cause a clot  to  loosen
and go to his lungs. It would kill him."
      "Well,  isn't that your objective? You  want  to  stop
treatment  and let him die," Orvin shot back. "A blood  clot
would  be a much easier death than discontinuing antibiotics
and waiting for the end."
      When my phone rang, Orvin was the angriest man in  the
state of Utah. "It's been like this for the past six months.
Dad's as safe as a cow in the slaughter house. They want  to
bury this transfusion mistake as soon as possible."
      Orvin's  outraged  voice reverberated  throughout  the
room. I held the phone a few inches away from my ear.
      "In  March  Madsen couldn't wait to get Dad  into  the
nursing  home, away from me, so he could take  him  off  his
heart  medications. But Dad fooled them and lived.  And  the
last few weeks we've been fed nothing but crap."
      My  head throbbed. It was a medical situation  no  one
should have to face. The blood bank and doctors' long, sorry
track  record left them without credibility. They could  not
be trusted and I personally felt much of what Orvin said was
true. Ulterior motives had been a factor in Dad's care.   It
was  obvious  that we had to get him under  the  care  of  a
doctor who practiced in a hospital that was not involved  in
the politics of his case.
      At  4:00  the next morning, Dad was loaded  inside  an
ambulance. A nurse from intensive care took her place beside
him.
      "You're going to Salt Lake," Orvin told Dad. "I'll  be
following in the car, right behind you."
     Dad was far too sick to respond.
      Three  hours  later the ambulance  pulled  up  to  the
emergency  entrance of the Holy Cross Hospital. Dr.  Kristen
Ries,  a  small  woman  with a short utility  hairstyle  was
waiting.  Instead  of the doctors' white coat,  she  wore  a
sweater, trousers and sturdy walking shoes. A Utah Physician
of the Year recipient, she was considered in medical circles
to be one of the city's busiest doctors.
      Dr.  Ries' practice of medicine was influenced by  her
Quaker  upbringing. She was very sensitive to the  needs  of
minorities,  often providing care to groups  unpopular  with
some  doctors. The elderly had always been one of her  major
concerns  and during the past five years she had  cared  for
many gays who were stricken with AIDS. Her patient load  was
said to be slanted toward "gays and grays."
      When  Dad was wheeled into the emergency room  he  was
unresponsive  and  cool all over. Dr. Ries  warmed  him  and
administered oxygen. She discontinued the Septra and treated
him with Pentamidine.
      Dad  was admitted to the AIDS ward and within a  short
time showed remarkable improvement. By the next afternoon he
was able to talk with Orvin and mentally follow what was  on
television.
      Dr.  Ries sat on the edge of Dad's bed and hugged him.
Hugs  were  one  of her therapies. She had a  demeanor  that
quickly  bridged  the  treatment-trust  gap  that   had   so
traumatized our family. We never questioned the  motives  of
Dad's new doctors. They never gave us any reason to.
      Dr. Ries ordered a bronchoscopy so that a small bit of
Dad's lung tissue could be studied for diagnosis.
     "I'm certain your father had has pneumocystis carinii,"
she said. "But it's probably too late to get a positive test
result  because  of the antibiotics he's been  on  the  past
week."  Dr.  Ries was right - the bronchoscopy results  were
negative.
      During the summer of 1987 the CDC had not yet expanded
the  guidelines  for  documenting AIDS cases.  There  was  a
narrow  range  of qualifying conditions which included  PCP.
But what we had not known was that it required documentation
by bronchoscopy.
      "Unlike Madsen told us, bronchoscopy was not needed to
get  'the  other' drug to treat pneumocystis," Orvin  fumed.
"It  was  needed to get counted as a transfusion AIDS  case.
There was a stall to keep him in Roosevelt where he couldn't
be  tested and documented. A stall to keep him on a drug  he
was allergic to."
      I  found  myself  agreeing with what  my  brother  was
saying. I thought back to the previous March when Madsen had
treated  Dad for a severe allergic reaction to Bactrim,  the
same  drug  as  Septra. Why had he ever put  Dad  on  Septra
instead of Pentamidine?
      I  hung  up  the  phone  wondering  how  Utah's  three
transfusion  AIDS  cases had ever lived long  enough  to  be
documented.


      For  decades the public was incorrectly led to believe
the  blood  supply  was  safe. When that  safety  image  was
tarnished by AIDS, public health officials and blood bankers
formulated a more convincing language. Our family called the
verbiage  "crock-talk" because it consisted of a barrage  of
meaningless  statistics, ambiguous  half-truths  and  a  few
blatant   lies.   For   transfusion  and   clotting   factor
recipients,  safe blood crock-talk became  the  language  of
death.

A  Meaningless Statistic: "The risk of getting AIDS  from  a
blood transfusion is less than one in a million."
      On August 2, 1983, Dr. Joseph Bove appeared before the
House  Subcommittee on AIDS. Dr. Bove was  chairman  of  the
FDA's  Blood Products Advisory Committee and of the American
Association  of Blood Banks' (AABB) Committee on Transfusion
Transmitted Diseases.
      At  the hearings, the doctor presented his charts  and
tables of the following meaningless statistics which did not
have the support of evidence:
1.    The risk of getting AIDS from a blood transfusion  was
  less than one in a million.
2.   The average American had twice the chance of dying in a
  flood than from AIDS contracted through a transfusion.
3.    A Californian should be twice as concerned about dying
  in an earthquake as from transfused AIDS.
4.     Anyone having an appendicitis operation would have 20
  times the chance of death.
      Dr. Bove did not discuss the chances of a newborn baby
and  an  elderly man from the Swain family both  contracting
AIDS  from  transfusions. If asked, I'm sure he  would  have
said the chance was infinitesimal, almost beyond the ability
of statisticians to compute.
       Dr.   Bove  continued  to  churn  out  his   creative
statistical risks for some time, but by the spring  of  1984
his concern had shifted to the danger of bees. Bove told the
Wall  Street  Journal that bee stings kill more people  than
transfusion AIDS.
      Orvin  is  not a statistician but he observed,  "There
weren't  two  million  Swains in Utah and  Colorado."  Orvin
doubts that there are ten thousand Swains in America.
     Until testing for AIDS began in early 1985, the one-in-
a-million  risk was continually parroted by health officials
and  blood  bankers.  There were an estimated  four  million
transfusions  given in the United States each year  with  an
average  of  5.4 component units used for each  transfusion.
With   a   one-in-a-million  risk,  the  total  HIV   (AIDS)
infections from the four million transfusions would be  four
per  year.  The AIDS virus is believed to have been  in  the
blood supply since 1978. If the one-in-a-million theory were
valid,  there  would  have  been  only  28  transfused  AIDS
infections given in the seven years before 1985.
      Instead,  a  Centers  of Disease Control  (CDC)  study
states,  "We estimate that 29,000 transfusion recipients  of
all  ages  from these years (1978-1984) received a  unit  of
blood infected by HIV." At four million per year, the number
of  transfusions given during the seven-year period  was  28
million  from  which 29,000 people received infected  units.
Therefore,  according to the CDC study, the risk of  getting
HIV  from a transfusion during these combined years was  not
one  in a million but one in 965! In 1983, during which  the
CDC  estimates 8,400 infections were given, the risk was one
in 476. And studies have found that in high-risk cities like
Los Angeles it was as high as one in 100.

A  Misleading Truth: "Less than half the people who  receive
HIV-infected blood transfusions will get AIDS."
      This  misleading statement is still occasionally heard
from  health officials and blood bankers. The public is  led
to believe there is more than a 50/50 chance of surviving  a
tainted  transfusion. That is untrue.  Almost  everyone  who
receives  a transfusion containing HIV will become  infected
with  the  AIDS virus, but approximately 60% will  die  from
their original illnesses within a year. Therefore, over half
of those infected will not live long enough to develop AIDS.
Yet  the public should not be misled into believing that  an
HIV-contaminated transfusion is inefficient in  transmitting
AIDS.  Dr.  Elizabeth Donegan, the lead  author  of  a  1990
medical study, told Associated Press, "It's important not to
have  any  illusions about how infectious HIV  is.  If  it's
there  in the transfusion, you'll get it." How many patients
considering elective surgery would be willing to  die  early
from their illness to avoid getting AIDS from a contaminated
transfusion?

A  Misleading Half Truth: "Concern about the safety  of  the
blood  supply  is  unwarranted except for  hemophiliacs  and
those requiring large amounts of blood."
      This is an earlier quote of health officials which was
often  used  in  the media. Actually there  was  reason  for
concern for patients receiving any amount of blood, large or
small.  But the risk multiplied with each unit received.  By
leaving  much  unsaid, the above statement was effective  in
diverting  attention away from prospective surgery  patients
who were not medically sophisticated enough to recognize the
danger  they  were in. Most Americans are not  knowledgeable
about  the types of surgical procedures that require  "large
amounts  of  blood." Our family was not  aware  that  bypass
surgery  could  necessitate the  transfusing  of  up  to  50
component units of blood.

An  Untruth: "I want to assure the American people that  the
blood supply is 100% safe."
      This  is  probably the biggest blood lie of all  time,
spoken  in  July  1983 by the country's  number  one  health
official,  Margaret Heckler, Secretary of the Department  of
Health  and  Human Services. Compare this to  the  following
statement  made by Brian McDonough, President of  the  Irwin
Blood  Bank in San Francisco, appearing on ABC TV's "20/20":
"The  blood supply has never been safe. The public is  being
told  it  is safe. This is just not true. Blood  is  a  very
dangerous drug."
      The  book Blood, Blood Products and AIDS published  by
John  Hopkins  Press  lists the known  types  of  infectious
agents  (germs)  that  can be given  to  a  patient  through
transfusion.  The  viral  category  includes  hepatitis   A;
hepatitis  B;  hepatitis non-A, non-B;  cytomegalovirus  and
Epstein-Barr  virus. Parasitic diseases that can  be  spread
through  the  blood  supply  include:  malaria,  filariasis,
trypanosomiasis, toxoplasmosis and babesiosis.  Syphilis  is
yet  another  type  of  infection that  can  be  transmitted
through  blood  transfusion, as can many different  disease-
causing bacterial organisms.
      There have been millions of hepatitis infections given
by  transfusion  in the United States during  the  past  two
decades.  The danger of viral infection escalated  with  the
appearance  of retroviruses, and HIV became the most  deadly
organism  in  the history of blood banking.  There  is  some
concern that another new or "improved" virus could bring the
next  future  disease  and  repeat  the  AIDS  crisis.  It's
possible  that  could  be happening in  the  1990's.  A  few
patients  with an AIDS-like illness are not testing positive
for HIV.
      Is  it possible for the blood supply to be 100%  safe?
No.  In  fact some experts feel blood transfusions  are  the
biggest obstacle to a safe recovery after surgery.

Another  Untruth:  "The blood supply is safe  both  for  the
hemophiliac  and for the average citizen who might  need  it
for surgery,"
      Secretary  Heckler told the press.  Hemophilia  is  an
inherited bleeding disorder which is passed in genetic  code
from  mother  to  son.  A family with  hemophilia  can  have
several  boys  who  use Factor VIII, a substance  that  when
injected  helps  their  blood  to  clot  normally.   Without
treatment, cuts may bleed for days and bleeding into  joints
can cause crippling deformities.
      Factor VIII is made from the pooled blood plasma of up
to 48,000 donors per batch. Before the clotting factors were
pasteurized  in 1985, the hemophiliac risk for getting  AIDS
was  horrendous. Such was the tragic fate of the three young
Ray boys in Florida who are all infected with HIV.
      In  the  Saturday Evening Post, Dr. Theresa  Crenshaw,
member  of  the  Presidential AIDS  Commission  assigned  to
safety   in  the  blood  supply,  wrote,  "Up  to   90%   of
hemophiliacs  requiring blood products have become  infected
with  AIDS, and most were infected while the blood  industry
delayed taking precautionary measures."

A  Half Truth: "We did all we could," say the blood bankers.
"We didn't have a test for AIDS."
     This statement can be refuted by the fact that they did
not  use surrogate tests for AIDS and they did not defer gay
men  from  their donor pools at an earlier date. Steps  were
not  taken  during the late '70s to implement all  available
tests  for hepatitis. Red Cross experts now admit  that  had
the  blood banks been using additional laboratory tests  for
hepatitis in the early 1980s, half of the AIDS contamination
in  the blood supply would have been removed even before the
presence  of  the  disease  was known.  Other  experts  feel
considerably more than half would have been removed as  AIDS
and hepatitis frequented the same high risk groups.
      In  January  1983, the CDC requested  a  meeting  with
representatives from the FDA, National Institutes of  Health
(NIH), American Red Cross, AABB, CCBC and the Pharmaceutical
Manufacturers     Association.    CDC    researchers     and
epidemiologists were alarmed at the mounting  evidence  that
AIDS  was  contaminating the nation's blood supply. However,
they  had  no  authority to take action that  would  protect
transfusion  recipients;  the  blood  supply  is  under  the
jurisdiction of the FDA.
      At  the meeting, one of the CDC's top virologists, Dr.
Thomas  Spira, presented evidence to support the CDC's  plea
for  the  testing  of  all  blood and  blood  products  with
surrogate  tests to eliminate donors who were  at  risk  for
AIDS.  At the time, there was no AIDS-specific test  because
the   virus  had  not  yet  been  identified.  However,  the
hepatitis B core antibody test could detect donors who had a
prior  history of hepatitis B. Most gay men and  intravenous
drug  users  had  such a history. Dr. Spira's  test  results
indicated  that the core test could identify 80% to  95%  of
the  patients with AIDS and could be used to eliminate  two-
thirds  of  the donors whose behavior put them at high  risk
for the new disease.
      The  CDC  doctors hoped that the blood industry  would
agree  to test all blood or, at the very least, would  adopt
strict guidelines to prevent people in high-risk groups from
donating. As it turned out, neither of these objectives  was
achieved and the meeting erupted into a fracas.
      Each  group represented had its interests to  protect.
The FDA group was annoyed because it felt the CDC was trying
to  usurp  its  authority over blood policy. At  first,  the
blood  bankers  chose  to  deny the  existence  of  an  AIDS
epidemic  and attempted to argue down the CDC evidence.  But
eventually they focused on the cost of the core test and the
loss   of  what  they  knew  would  be  6%  of  their   free
product_those  donations  that would  test  positive.  Blood
bankers  also  insisted that adoption of the test  would  do
nothing to improve blood safety.
      The  refusal to use the core test was not a result  of
pressure from the gay movement. There were leaders from  gay
groups  present at the Atlanta meeting. They did not  object
to  the  testing of blood but strongly opposed the screening
of  donors.  Surrogate testing could have  discreetly  begun
with little opposition from gay groups.
      The  assembly adjourned with no plan of action. Donald
Francis,  a retrovirologist who directed the CDC's  research
laboratory  on  AIDS, was both angry and  vocal  during  the
day's  discussions. At one point, he pounded the table  with
his fist and shouted, "How many people have to die? How many
deaths do you need?"
      Nine years later, after he left the employ of the CDC,
Dr.  Francis talked of the frustration he had felt in  early
1983. During testimony before a jury in Denver he said,  "It
was  frustration  I  had in their inability  to  accept  the
reality that AIDS could be transmitted through transfusions.
It  was something like having a bend in the train track  and
sitting there, and you hear the whistles and the signals are
blinking, and the tracks are beginning to shake, and they're
saying, `There's no train coming.'"
      But there is evidence that suggests blood leaders  did
realize  a  train was coming. Three weeks after the  Atlanta
meeting,  Dr. Joseph Bove, whose public stand was  that  the
blood supply was safe with less than a one-in-a-million risk
of  AIDS,  sent  his  Committee on  Transfusion  Transmitted
Diseases  a  memo. In his memo Dr. Bove stated that  he  was
certain  there  would soon be more cases of AIDS  contracted
from  transfusions  and  he believed  that  the  most  blood
bankers  could do was "buy time." He wrote, "We do not  want
anything that we do now to be interpreted by society (or  by
the  legal authorities) as agreeing with the concept_as  yet
unproven_that  AIDS  can be spread  by  blood."  Dr.  Bove's
colleagues  were  urged,  "I  hope  that  we  are   equipped
psychologically to continue to act together."
      Before  the memo was written, CDC doctors had informed
the  blood industry that AIDS was an exploding epidemic  and
that  the  virus  was transmitted through  transfusions  and
clotting  factors. The American Association of Blood  Banks'
Committee  on Transfusion Disease believed transfusion  AIDS
cases would continue to mount. Yet instead of protecting the
public, blood leaders chose to stall while they debated  and
studied  the issue to death. Unfortunately, transfusion  and
clotting factor recipients could not "buy time." Dr. Francis
testified that "tens of thousands of Americans" died because
of the blood industry's slow response.
     In their exposÇ, "Inside the Billion-Dollar Business of
Blood,"  Money  magazine concluded:  "The  problem  is  that
building  an  ever-increasing  supply  of  blood  feeds  the
industry's revenues, while taking steps to make blood safer,
or  to  reduce  unnecessary  transfusions  does  not.  Blood
suppliers are looking at the bottom line."
      Ross  D.  Eckert  is an economics  professor  who  has
studied  the blood industry and serves on the FDA Blood  and
Blood  Products  Committee. In the Reader's  Digest  special
report titled "How Safe is the Blood Supply?" Mr. Eckert  is
quoted  as  follows: "Blood banks are portrayed  as  heroic,
altruistic organizations. But in most communities they  have
been  either  monopolies or cartels. Tight screening  forces
them to discard more product which means lost revenues,  and
to  solicit even more donors. That's why they were  slow  to
respond to the AIDS threat."
      However,  the failure of blood banks to use  surrogate
tests for hepatitis and AIDS before 1987 was also partly due
to  medical  differences of opinion over the seriousness  of
the  two  diseases and the cause of AIDS. But probably  more
significant was the mindset of blood banking leaders  forged
by 40 years of blood monopoly_a tendency for complacency and
an unhealthy resistance to change or criticism.
     The HIV-specific test for screening out donors infected
with AIDS was implemented in March 1985. Two years later, in
1987  the  hepatitis  B  core  test  was  also  implemented.
Suddenly   the  test  that  would  do  nothing  to   improve
transfusion safety in 1983 was credible. The AIDS crisis had
focused  public attention on the blood supply. The extremely
high   post-transfusion  hepatitis  risk  which   had   been
downplayed  by  the  blood industry  during  the  1970s  was
attracting  media  attention. And despite the  exemption  of
blood  from  product liability, hepatitis and AIDS  lawsuits
were mounting. Because of increased consumer concern and the
threat  of  litigation,  blood  banks  finally  adopted  the
hepatitis B core test.

A Lame Excuse: "But," say the blood bankers, "we didn't know
how bad the AIDS threat was. We were dealing with an unknown
virus."
      To  a lay person it is inconceivable that doctors  and
scientists,   faced   with  a  killer  virus   they   didn't
understand,  would have chosen to err on the  side  of  risk
rather  than  on  the  side  of caution.  But  at  the  very
beginning  of the AIDS epidemic, many doctors in  the  blood
industry  believed  the  new  disease  among  gay  men   and
hemophiliacs  was  an  immune disorder  caused  by  frequent
exposure  to  foreign  human protein. Some  scientists  were
further  confused  by the long, variable  incubation  period
between infection and the time AIDS symptoms appeared.  They
doubted that the illness was caused by a virus.
      At  the  beginning of the epidemic these were  honest,
understandable mistakes. However, the CDC is  considered  to
be   the  world's  most  expert  organization  in  combating
epidemics.  Trained to take swift action, CDC  doctors  soon
became convinced that a virus was the cause of AIDS and that
it  was transmitted in the same ways as hepatitis B. The CDC
scientists  presented an urgent warning  to  blood  leaders,
accompanied by a plea for adoption of the hepatitis  B  core
test. Blood banking leaders chose to ignore the warning.
        While    initial    scientific    disagreement    is
understandable,  the  lengthy  foot-dragging  of  the  blood
industry  in  protecting the blood supply  is  indefensible.
There  was  a  delay of over two years without  any  testing
whatsoever  to identify suspect donors_despite a  constantly
growing  mountain of evidence which proved the blood  supply
was  contaminated. The plea by CDC doctors for  use  of  the
core test was made on January 4, 1983.
      Exactly two years to the day later_January 4,  1985_my
father  was  transfused  with  blood  containing  both   the
hepatitis  B  and  AIDS viruses. The core  test  would  have
prevented  his  AIDS  death and the HIV infections  of  many
thousands of other transfusion recipients between  1983  and
March 1985. The central question is: how much time did blood
banking  leadership  need  to  buy  before  changing   their
"scientific" opinion? A non-expert, responding  with  common
sense instead of the arrogant indifference displayed by  the
blood  monopoly, would have heeded the CDC doctors'  warning
and traveled the road of caution in early 1983.

A  Dangerous  Exaggeration:  "The  AIDS  antibody  test  has
virtually  eliminated  any  risk  of  AIDS  from  the  blood
supply."
     This assurance is constantly heard at the present time.
Although the risk of getting AIDS in a blood transfusion  is
significantly  reduced,  it can still  happen.  The  present
antibody test can miss some donors who are positive  because
there is a "window" between the moment of infection and  the
time antibodies are developed. During the window period  the
test  will  be  negative but the donor will be infected  and
contagious. Usually this window is from two weeks  to  three
months, but in a significant number of cases, it can  be  up
to six months. And a few people may never develop antibodies
to  the AIDS virus. As a result of some AIDS-positive donors
not  being detected, health authorities estimate as many  as
460 blood recipients a year can be infected with HIV.
      But  the risk from the test's inadequacy must be added
to yet another risk: the increasing problems blood banks are
having  with  human and computer error. A  medical  textbook
published by John Hopkins Press reports: "The experience  of
blood  transfusion services over many years is that  serious
failures in the release of infected donations are more often
the result of human error than of an intrinsic inadequacy of
laboratory tests."
      Human  error  may  occur at every  stage  of  testing,
particularly  in  transferring  specimens,  adding  reagents
(substances   that   chemically  react   to   detect   other
substances)   and  recording  results.  When   testing   for
hepatitis  and  AIDS, the reagents must be  of  the  highest
quality and be checked each day to ensure accuracy.
      The  complex computer systems used to track blood from
collection to transfusion and to permanently defer  infected
donors  are  crucial to blood safety. Any failure  in  these
systems or any data entry errors can cost the lives of blood
recipients.  Blood  banking is a complex business  requiring
meticulous  labeling  of blood and  safe  storage  at  exact
temperatures.
      Gilbert  Gaul,  the  Philadelphia Inquirer's  Pulitzer
Prize-winning  reporter on the blood industry,  studied  FDA
records between March 1988 and March 1989. During that  year
the  FDA  ordered blood banks and plasma centers  to  recall
nearly  100,000 blood components and medicines because  they
had been mistakenly released.
      In  April  1990  the FDA ordered Belle  Bonfils  Blood
Center  in  Denver  to  recall 11,000  units  of  blood  for
retesting. The FDA was afraid the blood might contain either
AIDS  or  hepatitis  as a result of incorrect  testing.  The
center's staff had followed the wrong procedures for  mixing
test  chemicals for a period of seven weeks. By the time  of
recall,  10,670  units  (97% of  11,000)  had  already  been
transfused  into  patients at 55 Colorado hospitals.  Sample
vials of each unit had been kept, but most of them had  been
discarded before retesting began.
      Dr.  Joel  Levine,  president of  Denver's  University
Hospital medical board, said the "statistical risk" was that
one  of  the  11,000 pints of blood drawn would be  infected
with the AIDS virus. Dr. Levine did not explain that if  one
HIV-infected  pint were drawn, it would be divided  into  at
least  three component units and given to a minimum of three
patients. Neither was the press told that there was  a  high
risk  of  getting  hepatitis  from  a  transfusion  of   the
incorrectly tested blood.
      For  over a week I recorded the meaningless statistics
and  reassuring  half truths that were fed to  the  Colorado
media.  Panic was avoided. But our family knows the  absence
of  public panic will be of small comfort to those who  will
suffer  from the blood-borne illnesses resulting  from  this
fiasco in human error.
      This  latest  incident was not  the  first  for  Belle
Bonfils.  In  1988 the FDA had reprimanded  the  center  for
distributing 22 units of blood despite initial test  results
showing them to be contaminated. These units were transfused
into 45 people.
      In  1989  a  jury ordered Belle Bonfils  to  pay  $5.5
million to a woman who got AIDS from blood supplied in 1985.
The center had not tested the blood although it was equipped
to do so.
      Today  there is still a risk of getting  AIDS  from  a
blood  transfusion. The window period allows a few  infected
units  to  slip  through  the test undetected.  Furthermore,
computers   and  personnel  are  prone  to  make   mistakes.
Therefore, "virtually every unit" of HIV tainted  blood  has
not been eliminated from the blood supply.
      The  evidence points to a conspiracy of the Red Cross,
the  two  major blood trade organizations and public  health
authorities  to  mislead the public on the  issue  of  blood
safety  and  keep  the  danger of  transfusions  downplayed.
Silence  on those dangers predated the arrival of AIDS  with
the   downplaying  of  astronomical  numbers  of   hepatitis
infections given to transfusion recipients during the 1970s.
It  will  be  argued  that  the  blood  conspiracy  is  well
intended_that  it  is  benign.  The  malignant  consequences
suggest otherwise. The blood conspiracy has been vast in its
scope,  long in its duration and devastating in its results.
(Copyright, 1993)


      The  blood industry has worked to suppress this  book.
While  blood  scandals  in Europe  have  been  reported  and
leaders  tried  as  criminals, America's  scandal  has  been
covered up.  Our blood leaders do not want attention focused
on  safety  problems, past or present.   Consequently,  they
lobby  against  and  block the safe-blood  legislation  that
states try to enact to inform patients of transfusion  risks
and options.
     Left without knowledge, consumers play Russian roulette
when  accepting transfusions from the regular banked supply.
But  there  are  many  medically sound  ways  to  reduce  or
entirely  eliminate these risks.  For a FREE REPORT  on  how
consumers  can  protect their loved ones  from  contaminated
blood   transfusions,  reply  on-line  and  leave  a  postal
address:        CompuServe       74077,2312,        Internet
[e-mail].  Or write to Safe Blood, P.O. Box
220, Woodland Park, CO 80866.

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