Again, some risks aren’t worth taking.
Last April, we argued that the B.C. government should deny a pay-for-plasma company’s application for a licence to operate in B.C. as it doesn’t take a hematologist to figure out that paying people cash in exchange for their blood donations is a bloody stupid idea.
Remember Canada’s tainted blood scandal, back in the 1980s?
All those innocent victims?
Well, here we are again.
On Tuesday, tainted blood survivors called on the province to ban the sale of blood and plasma at the Legislature in Victoria, delivering messages from more than 6,000 British Columbians who hope their Liberal government will follow the Ontario Liberal government’s lead and ban pay-for-plasma. The NDP, B.C.’s official opposition, is also calling for a ban on private plasma clinics.
Who sells their blood, anyway? Desperate people, that’s who. You certainly won’t see Mr. Peanut strolling into one of these places, with monocle, top hat and cane.
Who needs money? Drug users need money. And blood is something everyone has to sell. This includes people whose risky behaviour renders them spectacularly at risk of contracting blood-borne diseases like Hepatitis C and HIV.
Again, what public, in its right mind, could hold confidence in their province’s emergency blood supply if the authorities responsible for screening that very supply would permit such an outfit to do business here?
Again, please, B.C., say no to pay-for-plasma clinics.
The Now