Harney to establish inquiry into hepatitis C controversy

The Government is to establish a statutory committee of investigation later this year to examine how more than two dozen patients who tested positive for the hepatitis C virus were not told by the Blood Transfusion Service Board for several years.

A spokesman for the Tánaiste and Minister for Health, Ms Harney, told The Irish Times last night that the terms of reference for the inquiry had been agreed with the representative bodies for the patients infected with the virus.

The spokesman said that the investigation "would be progressed this year".

The inquiry was first promised two years ago by the former minister for health, Mr Martin, but it was never established and little had been heard publicly about the issue since then.

The statement from Ms Harney came as the Blood Transfusion Service Board confirmed that it had commissioned its own report from a German expert into the controversy.

The Blood Transfusion Service Board is understood to be facing legal action from a number of patients who claimed that they could have been treated earlier if they had been told that they had tested positive for hepatitis C when the blood board personnel first became aware of this.

The fact that there had been a delay in informing some patients that they had tested positive for hepatitis C first emerged at the official tribunal of inquiry into the contamination of blood products in 1997.

However, it was only in 2002 that it emerged that there were around 28 patients involved.

RTÉ News yesterday reported that the independent report commissioned by the Blood Transfusion Service Board from the German expert, Prof Bernard Kubanek, had found that close to 100 people initially tested positive for the hepatitis C virus in the early 1990s but were not informed at the time.

RTÉ said that the report found that confirmatory testing later reduced this number to 34.

The blood transfusion service said last night in a statement that the final report by Prof Kubanek was not available for the board for its meeting yesterday.

"The board expected that the report will be finalised in time for the March meeting and the board will discuss the report and its implications at that time", the statement said.

The Department of Health said last night that it would like to see the publication of the Kubanek report.

All the patients involved were from the Munster region.

The director of the Munster centre of the Blood Transfusion Service Board, Dr Joan Power - who is widely credited with discovering the contamination of blood products with the hepatitis C virus - told the Finlay tribunal of inquiry that she had made a mistake in not immediately informing a patient who had tested positive for the hepatitis C virus.

Dr Power said yesterday that she had not seen the German expert's report but that she had repeatedly called for a full public inquiry into all matters surrounding her finding of the contamination of blood products with the hepatitis C virus.