Leader: Fight for justice should not have lasted so long

Compensation and inquiry findings will be welcome – but victims of the infected blood scandal have waited decades

Today will be a watershed moment for thousands of campaigners who have spent decades fighting for justice in the infected blood scandal.

Tens of thousands of people were infected with contaminated blood or blood products between the 1970s and early 1990s in what has been described as the worst treatment disaster in the history of the NHS.

It was not until 2017, under the premiership of Theresa May, that an official inquiry into the scandal was set up, following years of campaigning by victims and their families.

Martin Reid has lived with life-long health impacts after being infected with hepatitis C as a child. Photo: Martin Reid/PA Wire

That inquiry, chaired by former judge Sir Brian Langstaff, will give its final recommendations today, with the UK government expected to deliver an official response during the week.

It is thought compensation payments could run to at least £10 billion.

After a decades-long fight, this will be welcome news for victims such as Martin Reid, from Insch in Aberdeenshire, who was infected with hepatitis C as a child while receiving treatment for his haemophilia. Mr Reid’s hepatitis was cleared in 2011 following treatment, but he has been left with lasting effects from the virus including anxiety and depression.

He said: “I do feel a sense of survivor’s guilt – especially as the inquiry has been hearing so many harrowing and heart-breaking stories about people’s children being infected and dying at a very early age, or people being infected, never being told and subsequently going on to infect other members of their family.”

Of course the guilt lies not with Mr Reid and the other victims but with those in charge of the NHS who oversaw this scandal and were slow to act as evidence of it began to emerge.

Today’s report comes too late for around 3,000 victims who have died. Campaigners believe a victim dies roughly every four days. The length of time it has taken to get to where we are now is a scandal in itself.

One of the many lessons we must learn from this inquiry is that victims of medical disasters should not be made to wait decades for justice.