Why has the greatest patient scandal in the history of the NHS rumbled on for so long before its victims even start to see justice?
It shouldn’t have taken 40 years for there to be an answer
Today the government awarded £100,000 in interim compensation to around 4,000 survivors of the contaminated blood scandal, as recommended by Sir Robert Francis, who published a report on the matter earlier this year. They have been fighting for 40 years for justice that, as yet, does not cover the bereaved parents and children of those who were infected with HIV and Hepatitis C when they were given dirty blood products for their haemophilia or blood transfusions. For that, they will have to wait until the conclusion of the public inquiry led by Sir Brian Langstaff later this year.
Contaminated blood was far worse in terms of scale and government culpability than much better-known scandals such as thalidomide.
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