-Caveat Lector- From http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/front/RTGAM/20021120/wblud1120_ 2/Front/homeBN/breakingnews
Via http://www.americanfreedomnews.com/ Charges laid in blood probe By DARREN YOURK and ANDR� PICARD Globe and Mail Update Wednesday, November 20 � Online Edition, Posted at 5:39 PM EST The RCMP has laid criminal charges against the Canadian Red Cross Society, four doctors and a pharmaceutical company after a five-year investigation into the tainted-blood scandal of the 1980s. At a press conference in Toronto on Wednesday, the RCMP Blood Task Force announced charges of criminal negligence causing bodily harm under Section 221 of the Criminal Code of Canada, charges of common nuisance by endangering the public under Section 180 of the Criminal Code of Canada, as well as a charge of failure to notify under the Food and Drugs Act Regulations. Please see also: Krever commission report RCMP Blood Task Force "The responsibility of the RCMP as Canada's national police service is to ensure safe homes and safe communities," said superintendent Rod Knecht, officer in charge of the Toronto- based RCMP Blood Task Force. "In fulfilling this mandate, the primary responsibility of the RCMP Blood Task Force was to gather the facts on behalf of the Canadian public, and to lay criminal charges if the evidence supported reasonable grounds that a criminal offence had occurred." The Red Cross � through its former Blood Transfusion and Blood Donor Recruitment Services in Ottawa � is charged with six counts of common nuisance by endangering the public. Roger Perrault, 66, an Ottawa doctor and the former director of the Red Cross Society's Blood Transfusion Service, is charged with three counts of criminal negligence causing bodily harm and seven counts of common nuisance by endangering the public. John Furesz, 75, an Ottawa doctor is charged with three counts of criminal negligence causing bodily harm and one count of common nuisance by endangering the public. Nepean, Ont., doctor Wark Boucher, 62, is charged with three counts of criminal negligence causing bodily harm and one count of common nuisance by endangering the public. Dr. Boucher was the former chief of the Blood Products Division of the Bureau of Biologics at the federal government's Health Protection Branch. The Armour Pharmaceutical Company, a Delaware Corporation, based in Bridgewater, N.J., is charged with three counts of criminal negligence causing bodily harm and one count of common nuisance by endangering the public under the Criminal Code of Canada, as well as one count of failure to notify under the Food and Drugs Act Regulations. "The charges we have announced today reflect the fact that our investigation has met the requirements to lay these particular charges," Mr. Knecht said. "It is important to note that there are specific aspects of this investigation that we continue to pursue. The possibility exists that we will be laying further charges." Pierre Duplessis, secretary-general and chief executive officer of the Canadian Red Cross, said Wednesday that his agency is not the same agency it was 20 years ago. "We have taken our responsibilities seriously. Since 1998, we have transferred the blood program, restructured the society, settled all civil claims, and provided compensation," Mr. Duplessis said at a news conference on Wednesday. "Today we cannot respond in a formal way, as we have not yet had an opportunity to review the charge carefully. In the weeks ahead, we will be determining our course of action in consultation with our board of governors and legal counsel." But as a humanitarian organization, Mr. Duplessis said "our first thoughts are with those people affected by this tragedy and their families." He reiterated that the agency is "terribly sorry" for its part in the tragedy and the pain caused to those affected. An estimated 2,000 recipients of blood and blood products were infected with the AIDS virus between 1980 and 1985. Another 60,000 transfusion recipients contracted the potentially debilitating hepatitis C virus between 1980 and 1990. In an exhaustive 1,138-page report on the tragedy released in November of 1997, Mr. Justice Horace Krever concluded that a significant number of those infections were preventable and chronicled a series of failures, both institutional and individual, that contributed to one of Canada's worst public-health tragedies. Under the terms of his mandate, Judge Krever was not permitted to make findings of criminal or civil liability, but he was able, after a long court battle, to single out individuals for allegations of wrongdoing. In a letter sent to the RCMP a few days after the report's release, the Canadian Hemophilia Society asked investigators to focus on four principal areas of failure that caused "needless waste of innocent lives": The decision not to introduce surrogate testing for the hepatitis C virus between 1986 and 1990. In his report, Judge Krever said that failure led to the infection of 28,600 Canadians and that 85 per cent of those cases were preventable. Delays in introducing testing for the human immunodeficiency virus in the blood supply. A test was available March 2, 1985, but universal testing was not in place until Nov. 1 of that year. The report concluded that at least 133 people contracted HIV in that period. Delays in the introduction of concentrates that were heat-treated to kill the AIDS virus. A decision was made in November, 1984, to make the switch to the safer product, but it was not completed until July, 1985. Judge Krever concluded that the inventory of unheated products was deliberately exhausted and, had blood-system officials acted properly, "some of the hemophiliacs would have avoided being infected." The continued use of heat-treated products that proved ineffective as late as 1987. After the belated switch to heat-treated concentrates, questions remained about the efficiency of heating methods to kill the virus; that, coupled with the fact that manufacturers continued to use plasma that was not tested for the AIDS virus, led to the infection of a number of other hemophiliacs in 1986-87, after the products were declared free of HIV. With a report from Allison Lawlor Copyright � 2002 Bell Globemedia Interactive Inc. 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