Deadly flaws in the US ‘cash for blood’ system | Letters

Concerns about the quality of blood products from the United States were raised nearly half a century ago, writes Martyn Berry

The "bad blood" tragedy could so easily have been avoided (May orders inquiry into contaminated blood scandal, 12 July). Professor Richard Titmuss's book The Gift Relationship, published in 1970, showed clearly in a comparison of the American system (donors paid for blood) and the British one (unpaid, altruistic donors) that payment leads to drug addicts, alcoholics, convicts and desperately poor malnourished people selling their blood.

I reviewed Titmuss's book in the Times and I recall there was a review in the Guardian. Titmuss created something of a sensation at the time, and NHS bosses and the appropriate ministers and senior civil servants cannot plausibly have missed it. I hope the inquiry will go into this aspect.
Martyn Berry
Kemsing, Kent

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