I am inclined to think of this as typical Portugeuse panic-mongering (ask me another time about the customers we lost at the bar when it was put about that one of our bartenders had HepC), but was wondering whether anyone stateside could confirm the allegation that “The US has recently adopted…not to accept any blood plasma from the UK nor any blood donor who has spent more than six months in the UK.” Hell, I’d further love to hear from any European who’s heard of the apparent extension of this policy to “the rest of Europe”.
I admit to knowing nothing of the American medical system. Is there a governing body in this case that would decide policy unilaterally for all 50 states?
The American Red Cross has adopted this policy. The reason is “mad cow” disease. There are also new restrictions on European blood donors from any country that has had the human form of mad cow. There’s a fear that there are people walking around incubating the disease but not yet showing symptoms who could unknowingly transmit the disease to others if they donate blood. The UK being the hot bed of mad cow, UK blood donors are now banned from donating to the US blood supply. There’s no proof it can be transmitted by blood, but there’s no proof it can’t be spread that way, either, so folks here decided to err on the side of caution. The American Red Cross supplies the majority of donated blood in the US, and other collection agencies tend to follow their lead.
The FDA (Food and Drug Administration - I think that’s the correct government agency) also has a say in this and were in favor of adopting slightly less stringent criteria, but still were intending to essentially ban UK blood and blood products from entering the US. Since the Red Cross and just about all other blood agencies in the US have adopted restrictions at least as stringent as the government proposed, the FDA is now turning its attention to keeping possibily mad cow contaminated food/drug/other ingestible products out of the US.
Well, thanks everyone for the info. I should have done a little research first- I just found it strange how the 2 hospitals in the region here had differing policies.
Apparently, the restrictions have been in place for some time (at least in Canada, America, New Zealand, and France) according to this article:
And it gets worse. From this more recent article (Jan./2001)in the British Medical Journal:
we learn that “An FDA committee will meet this month to discuss extending restrictions on who can donate blood to include people who lived in Europe for six or more months in the 1990s. The committee is also expected to discuss whether to ban donations from deer and elk hunters.” (Apparently chronic wasting disease has been spreading in elk & deer.)
Hmm. Being non-British and a vegetarian, it makes one want to rush out and donate blood.
Yep, we don’t know yet know the long-term consequences of exposure to what was ‘mad cow disease’ (BSE) is for humans or how many were exposed. Could be not too serious or a huge ticking bomb.
Obviously it’s best to take precautions for the foreseeable future.
they still take northern irish people’s blood (but they won’t take mine…boohoo) because, as the Reverend Ian Paisley said
“the people are British, but the cows are Irish.”
he was saying that northern irish beef was safe, and thus should have been allowed to be exported when the ban on british beef was in place. he was also re-iterating his unionist position.
and yes, i believe the man has SOME form of mental degradation…but calling it “mad cow disease” is insulting the cows.