I asked the representative of the National Blood Authority if he was aware of the early history of the Red Cross and Health Department’s responses to ensuring the safety of blood products used in Australia.
He stated that the National Blood Authority had not been established at that time but recalled that Australia was one of the first countries to adopt measures to ensure the safety of blood transfusions.
Minister Gallagher took a defensive stance and denied any wrongdoing by the government at the time, and undertook to provide information to confirm this. However, I already have information showing she is mistaken and covering up for a government that disgracefully allowed many people to become sick, knowing this was a possibility.
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you, Mr Cahill, for being here. In the 1970s, were the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories, the Australian Red Cross and the federal health department aware that hepatitis C, which was then referred to as non-A, non-B hepatitis, was present in Australia’s blood supply and blood products?
Mr Cahill: The issues you’re raising preceded the creation of the National Blood Authority in 2003, so they’re issues for the Department of Health that they might want to address. But I can say that, yes, there was an awareness at a point in time.
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for making it clear that your entity didn’t exist. In the 1970s and 1980s, were the federal health department, the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories and the Australian Red Cross aware that the practice of mass-pooling blood donations for fractionation, specifically for manufacturing haemophilia treatments like factor VIII and factor IX concentrates, significantly raised the risk of contaminating these products with hepatitis C, which was then non-A and non-B hepatitis virus?
Senator Gallagher: What’s the question? Prof. Lawler: Sorry, to whom is the question directed?
Senator ROBERTS: It was to the National Blood Authority, but it might predate you.
Senator Gallagher: It’s hard to answer things from 50 years ago.
Mr Comley: Chair, we’re trying to work this out. I know we very rarely say ‘relevance to the estimates’, but I am—
CHAIR: I apologise, Mr Comley. Sorry, Senator Roberts. I can’t hear you, because you’re a bit away from the microphone, so I didn’t hear the question.
Mr Comley: His question is about blood product practices in the 1980s, and I’m just—
Senator Gallagher: It was the seventies.
Mr Comley: It was the seventies and eighties.
CHAIR: Could you just repeat the question, Senator Roberts? Come a bit closer to the microphone.
Senator ROBERTS: Sure. There are many people in Australia who are still crippled by contaminated blood. Some of that originated in the seventies and eighties. In the United Kingdom, they’ve addressed this and given compensation. In Australia, we’re apparently pretending that it doesn’t exist. This affected budgets. It affects livelihoods. Shall I continue?
CHAIR: Could you put it as a question?
Senator Gallagher: I mean, we do usually have pretty wide-ranging question opportunities, but, I have to say, going back over 50 years and asking officials at the table is a bit difficult, Senator Roberts.
Senator ROBERTS: These people have recently made an official complaint to the Australian Federal Police.
Senator Gallagher: Okay, well—
Senator ROBERTS: In Britain, they have given people compensation fairly recently. In other countries they’ve done it too, but not in Australia.
Senator Gallagher: Again, we’re happy to assist where we can.
Senator ROBERTS: It’s a legacy that’s hanging over the Australian government.
Mr Cahill: I can make some observations, even though the issues did precede—
CHAIR: Sure, but I still haven’t heard a question. I’m sorry.
Senator ROBERTS: No, there was a question in there. Do you want me to do it again?
Mr Cahill: The question as I understood it was, ‘Is there awareness?’
Senator ROBERTS: Yes.
Mr Cahill: The answer is: yes, there was awareness.
Senator ROBERTS: It’s about the fractionation.
Mr Cahill: There was an evolution of scientific knowledge around that time. All of these issues have been canvassed through a range of inquiries that occurred also over time, including a Senate inquiry in 2004 that took evidence about these matters. There was also an inquiry in 2001 by Sir Ninian Stephen, the former Governor General, and that actually led to the creation of the National Blood Authority in 2003.
Senator ROBERTS: So there’s a problem that caused your [inaudible] formation.
Mr Cahill: There have been compensation arrangements put in place. There has been access to antivirals for people affected by hepatitis C. The governments collectively across Australia have invested substantially in the safety of Australia’s blood supply since then. I think in the early 1990s or maybe the late eighties—but certainly by the early nineties—as soon as the scientific evidence emerged about the risks associated with HIV, the practices were changed.
Senator ROBERTS: Okay, let’s skip all of the details—
Mr Cahill: Drawing analogies with the UK inquiry, there are substantial differences between what occurred during the UK during that period, which has been the subject of the inquiry you’re referring to, and what transpired in Australia.
Senator ROBERTS: Can the government clarify its stance on the handling of the infected blood scandal, particularly in light of the Commonwealth Serum Laboratories’ decision to delay the implementation of viral inactivation or heat treatment for factor IX until 1993?
Mr Cahill: I don’t think there is evidence that that’s what occurred.
Senator Gallagher: I think we’ll take that on notice.
Senator ROBERTS: That’s fine.
Senator Gallagher: If there’s anything we can provide you, Senator Roberts—I’m not sure we will be, but let’s just see.
Senator ROBERTS: Is it true that this delay occurred despite global practices by other manufacturers, such as British plasma laboratories, in heat treatment for hepatitis C, from 1985 onwards, to provide heat treated products to safeguard against this virus?
Mr Cahill: I think the inquiry’s concluded that Australia was one of the first countries to respond to the emergence of the new virus.
Senator ROBERTS: What actions are being taken to identify those Australians now at risk of having received tainted blood when the blood should have been safe? Other countries had it safe. We didn’t.
Mr Cahill: I don’t accept that premise.
Senator Gallagher: I’m not accepting that proposition. I think we have very safe systems here.
Senator ROBERTS: We might have now, but we didn’t then. It was neglected and people are crippled as a result of that. That’s what I’m after. Some of my constituents are seriously in trouble through neglect. It’s time for those involved in this horrendous scandal to come clean. Why are we burying this? Why aren’t we looking?
Senator Gallagher: Again, I don’t agree. The evidence that you’ve just been given would indicate an alternative view on that. Perhaps there’s a way that we can send you all the links, for all the reviews and things that have been done, and inquiries into it and the responses to those, and you can have a see.
Senator ROBERTS: That would be fine, thank you.
Question on Notice – No. 745
Senator ROBERTS: What actions are being taken to identify those Australians now at risk of having received tainted blood when the blood should have been safe? Other countries had it safe. We didn’t.
Mr Cahill: I don’t accept that premise.
Senator Gallagher: I’m not accepting that proposition. I think we have very safe systems here.
Senator ROBERTS: We might have now, but we didn’t then. It was neglected and people are crippled as a result of that. That’s what I’m after. Some of my constituents are seriously in trouble through neglect. It’s time for those involved in this horrendous scandal to come clean. Why are we burying this? Why aren’t we looking?
Senator Gallagher: Again, I don’t agree. The evidence that you’ve just been given would indicate an alternative view on that. Perhaps there’s a way that we can send you all the links, for all the reviews and things that have been done, and inquiries into it and the responses to those, and you can have a see.
Senator ROBERTS: That would be fine, thank you.
Answer
The safety of Australia’s blood supply during the 1980s was examined through the 2004 Senate Inquiry into Hepatitis C and the Blood Supply in Australia. The full report, ‘Hepatitis C and the Blood Supply in Australia’, is available at www.aph.gov.au.
The Australian Government has implemented a range of initiatives consistent with the Senate Community Affairs References Committee’s recommendations including ongoing funding for the Australian Red Cross Lifeblood’s (Lifeblood) Lookback program, which investigates infections possibly transmitted through blood transfusion. More information on Lifeblood’s Lookback program is available at www.lifeblood.com.au/blood/blood-testing-and-safety.
Further Government initiatives include implementing national strategies and programs to address blood borne viruses, including hepatitis C, and subsidising medicines to treat hepatitis C and other blood borne viruses through the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS). Since 2016, the Government has invested over $7 billion to provide access to curative direct acting antiviral medicines through the PBS, to all eligible Australians regardless of how they acquired hepatitis C or their current circumstances.
