The Irish Blood Transfusion Service insisted yesterday that a Kerry woman who tested positive for the hepatitis C virus within months of having three blood transfusions had not received contaminated blood.
It said all five of those whose blood had been used in the transfusions given to Eileen Kelly (76) in September 2004 and February 2005 had been traced and they tested negative for the virus.
Dr Joan O'Riordan, head of virology testing at the National Blood Centre, said once the donors who gave the blood tested negative six months after they had been implicated there was no way they could have passed on the infection to Ms Kelly from Mill Road, Killarney.
Dr O'Riordan explained that two tests were used by the IBTS to detect hepatitis C in blood donations. These test for antibodies to the virus and for the virus itself and a person infected with the virus would be antibody positive 70 days later, she said. The second test would give a positive result just 10 days after infection, she added.
Any donor who tested negative for the virus six months after initial concerns were raised about their hepatitis C status could start giving blood again, she said. "We reinstate them on the active donor panel . . . and then they are obviously tested every single time they donate again".
Dr O'Riordan added that the risk of a patient contracting hepatitis C could never be ruled out but the risk was now one in four million. This meant one case might be expected every 26 years. The IBTS investigates up to three cases a year where hospitals express concern about how patients contract infections but no transfusion linked cases of hepatitis C have been found for several years. "It's a very rare risk these days but we investigate any cases reported to us," she said.
Ms Kelly's son Dennis said last evening that if the IBTS said all the donors were negative he could not dispute that. "The only thing I'm asking is if she didn't get it from the donors where did she get it from". He was also concerned, he said, that it took months to trace all five donors for retesting.
The IBTS suggested Ms Kelly may have become infected while undergoing treatment in the US, where she lived from 1950 to 1967.