The LINDSAY tribunal, which was due to resume its public hearings today after the summer recess, has been adjourned for 24 hours as a mark of respect to the latest haemophiliac to die from an infected blood product.
Mr John Berry (62), from Athy, Co Kildare, who was married with three children, was the 75th haemophiliac to die in the past 15 years from infected products administered in the State.
The former lorry-driver, who died at his home on Sunday, was one of only two victims to give evidence using his own name last May in the first phase of the public hearings.
In his evidence Mr Berry described how he contracted hepatitis C in 1979 from a contaminated Factor 8 blood product which he received for a nose-bleed. He said it was "the first and only time" he received Factor 8, adding that it was his wish before dying to find out who was responsible for administering it. Mr Berry first discovered he had mild haemophilia A, the most common form of the condition, in 1973 following a serious car accident.
The first treatment he received was in 1979 when he suffered a nose-bleed which he said he could not stop. He went to the National Haemophilia Treatment Centre at St James's Hospital and was given Factor 8, a clotting agent used by haemophilia A patients.
Before the treatment, he said, he was in great health. He was not diagnosed with hepatitis C until 1991 despite showing symptoms and attending treatment up to twice a day. He said he did not ask questions at the time.
Around the same time, he was also told he had liver cancer. Since then, he said, he had felt he was "on death row . . . I have no future. My future, my family's future is gone."
Making matters worse, he said, he was given the impression he was suffering from HIV as well as hepatitis C. Asked if any counselling was offered to explain that he was not suffering from HIV, he replied: "Not at that particular time, but there is now".
Asked what he expected the tribunal to achieve, he said he would like to know who was responsible for giving him hepatitis C. "I know how I got it, but why was it given to me when the blood wasn't right?"
Mr Berry was the third haemophiliac to die since the tribunal was established a year ago this month, but the first since the public hearings began.
A spokesman for the Irish Haemophilia Society said the death emphasised the importance of having the victims' evidence heard at the opening of the tribunal. The society had argued that, as many of the haemophiliacs were seriously ill, they should be allowed to give their evidence first.
A number of parties to the tribunal objected to the approach, claiming it might put them at a disadvantage, especially if unsubstantiated claims were made. However, Judge Alison Lindsay ruled in the society's favour. The next witness who will give evidence tomorrow will be Mr John Keating, a senior technical officer with the Blood Transfusion Service Board during the 1980s.
He is due to be followed by Dr Helena Daly, a locum doctor who worked for the NHTC in 1985 and appeared to have been extremely concerned at the time at the board's failure to adopt safer blood products for haemophiliacs.
Mr John Finlay SC, for the tribunal, said Dr Daly appeared to have made "a critical intervention" in August 1985 which led to the heat-treating of Pelican House products.
Also giving evidence in the coming phase of the tribunal, which will examine the internal decision-making procedures of the BTSB during the 1980s when most of the infections occurred, will be Mr John McStay, an accountant who has been employed by the Irish Blood Transfusion Service, as the board has become, to examine its financial records.
Mr McStay, an insolvency expert, will act as an expert witness on the service's finances between the late 1970s and early 1990s. Questioning on this area had been deferred from the previous sitting as the IBTS's expert medical witness, Dr Emer Lawlor, said she was not qualified to deal with financial matters.
