What is the infected blood scandal and how much compensation will the victim get?

Government officers were appointed to give a special meeting of the infected blood test in the middle of the “serious concerns” about the speed of the compensation payments.

The chairman of the investigation, Sir Brian Langstaff, made the unusual decision to make new evidence almost a year after his final report in the scandal.

More than 30,000 people in Great Britain were infected with HIV and hepatitis C after they had given contaminated blood products in the 1970s and 1980s.

Up to 140,000 bereaved, children and siblings of victims can also be able to claim compensation themselves.

Who received infected blood and how many did it die?

Two main groups of NHS patients were affected by a so -called treatment disaster in the history of the NHS.

Firstly, hemophilic – and those with similar diseases that have a rare genetic disease, which means that your blood is not properly furnished.

People with hemophilia A have a lack of a coagulation called factor VIII, while people with hemophilia B do not have enough factor IX.

In the 1970s, new treatment with donated human blood plasma was developed to replace these coagulation agents.

But entire batches were contaminated with fatal viruses.

After the infected treatments had been given, around 1,250 people in Great Britain developed with bleeding disorders both HIV and Hepatitis C, including 380 children.

About two thirds later died of AIDS-related diseases. Some gave their partners unwanted.

Another 2,400 to 5,000 people developed hepatitis C themselves, which can lead to cirrhosis and liver cancer.

It is difficult to know the exact number of people infected with hepatitis C, partly because it can take decades for symptoms to occur.

A second group of patients received contaminated blood transfusions between 1970 and 1991 after birth, operation or other medical treatment.

The investigation estimates that between 80 and 100 of these people with HIV and about 27,000 were infected with hepatitis C.

A total of around 2,900 people have died.

What did the infected blood test said?

The investigation announced its results in May 2024 and said the victims “not even but repeatedly” failed, and the risk of virus infections in blood products had been known since 1948.

Sir Brian Langstaff, chairman of the inquiry, said that the authorities and elements of “almost deception”, including the destruction of documents, had given lack of openness.

He said that half -truths were also told, so that people were nothing about the risk of their treatment, the availability of alternatives or even about whether they were infected.

“This disaster was not an accident,” said Sir Brian. “The infections occurred because the authorities – doctors, the bloodstreams and the successive governments – did not come first.”

The inquiry report says:

• Too little was carried out in order not to import blood products from abroad, the blood of high -risk donors such as prisoners and drug addicts used

• In the UK, blood donations from high -risk groups such as prisoners were accepted until 1986

• The blood products were only treated with heat at the end of 1985 to eliminate HIV, although the risks were known in 1982

• There were too few tests to reduce the risk of hepatitis from the 1970s

How much compensation will infected blood victims get?

In October 2024, Chancellor Rachel Reeves said that the government had put aside £ 11.8 billion to pay compensation to the victims.

It ceased an independent body with the infected blood compensation authority (IBCA) to manage payments.

Both those who are infected by contaminated blood products and are affected by the scandal – such as partners, parents, children and siblings – can claim compensation for the effects on their lives.

Payments are exempt from the tax and do not affect.

The final amounts for individuals are evaluated on the basis of five criteria: damage caused, social effects of stigma and isolation, effects on autonomy and private life, care costs and financial losses.

The then conservative government outlined the remuneration scheme after the investigation registered in May 2024 and suggested how many people could receive:

• A person infected with HIV could receive compensation between 2.2 and 2.6 million GBP

• Those with chronic hepatitis -c infection that is permanently defined as more than six months could expect to receive between 665,000 and 810,000 GBP

• The partner of someone who is infected with HIV who is still alive today

Compensation payments will go to the estate of infected people who have died.

But if a partner or relative who may have claimed a payment has died, his estate receives no money.

Have already made compensation payments?

At the end of 2022, the conservative government delivered an interdependency of £ 100,000 to around 4,000 surviving victims and survivors after advice from the investigation. A second preliminary payment of 210,000 GBP was paid to those who were infected in June 2024.

In October 2024, the government said that more relatives of people who died could also apply for 100,000 pounds if the money had not yet been claimed.

The IBCA said from May 6th:

• 677 people were invited to claim final compensation

• 160 remuneration payments of a total of 150.2 million GBP were offered

• 106 remuneration payments of a total of 96.6 million GBP were carried out

An IBCA spokesman said that his priority was “as soon as possible as soon as possible”. It is planned to ask for an additional 100 people to start their claims every week from May 2025.

It was also announced that it would start to prioritize payments to those who had less than 12 months due to any illness to live.

Victims and their relatives have criticized the time required to pay payments, and what they say is a lack of transparency about the claim process.

On April 9, Sir Brian said that he would reopen the investigation on May 7th and 8th in order to obtain evidence of the speed of the compensation payments.

Government officers, including the minister of the Nick Thomas Symond cabinet office, will provide evidence under oath and the sessions are turned and streamed online.

Sir Brian said: “The decision to hold hearings was not made lightly. She reflects the severity of the concerns that consistently and repeatedly expresses the examination.

“Infected and those affected have no time on their side.”

How did the infected blood scandal happen?

In the 1970s, Great Britain fought to satisfy the demand for blood torn treatments, so that imported supplies were imported from the USA.

But a large part of the blood was bought by high -risk donors such as inmates from prisons and drug users.

Factor VIII was manufactured by pooling plasma by tens of thousands of donors.

If only one virus was wearing, the entire batch could be contaminated.

The blood donations in Great Britain were only routinely examined for hepatitis C in 1991, 18 months after the first identification of the virus.

When did the authorities know about infected blood?

In the mid-1970s there were repeated warnings that imported the US factor VIII, a higher risk of infection.

However, attempts to make Britain more self -sufficient in blood products failed, so that the NHS continued to use foreign deliveries.

Activists say that hemophil could have been offered an alternative treatment called Cryoprecipitats. This was much more difficult to give, but was made from the blood plasma of a single donor, which reduced the risk of infection.

BBC News has also discovered evidence that children were infected with hepatitis C and HIV after they were infected in clinical studies with new treatments without the consent of their family – often infected without their family's consent.

November 1983, the government insisted that there was no “conclusive evidence” that HIV could be transferred to blood, a line that the former conservative Minister of Health Ken Clarke, when he appeared before the investigation, defended.

What happened in other countries that are affected by infected blood?

Many other countries were affected, although some – including Finland – started older treatments until much later, instead of switching to factor VIII, which minimized HIV infections.

Sir Brian provided the findings of the investigation and criticized the British government in the nineties that the screening on hepatitis C began as soon as the technology was available.

He said that 23 other countries – including Japan, Finland and Spain – introduced the screening off the UK.

In the United States, companies that have provided infected products have paid millions in extrajudicial settlements.

Politicians and drug companies were convicted of negligence in countries such as France and Japan.

In his evidence of the investigation, the former health minister Andy Burnham suggested that there may be reason for charges for corporate mowers in Great Britain.