Blood Feuds

In the mid-1980s public health officials in North America Europe Japan and Australia discovered that almost half of the haemophiliac population as well as tens of thousands of blood transfusion recipients had been infected with HIV-tainted blood. This book provides a comparative perspective on the political legal and social struggles that emerged in response to the HIV contamination of the blood supply of the industrialized world. It describes how eight nations responded to the first signs that AIDS might be transmitted through blood how early efforts to secure the blood supply faltered and what measures were ultimately implemented to resolve the contamination. The authors detail the remarkable mobilization of haemophiliacs who challenged the state the medical establishment and their own caregivers to seek recompense and justice. In the end the blood establishments in almost all the advanced industrial nations were shaken. In Canada the Red Cross was forced to withdraw from blood collection and distribution. In Japan pharmaceutical firms that manufactured clotting factor agreed to massive compensation -- $500000 per haemophiliac infected. In France blood officials went to prison. Even in Denmark where the number of infected haemophiliacs was relatively small the struggle and litigation surrounding blood has resulted in the most protracted legal and administrative conflict in modern Danish history. Blood Feuds brings together chapters on the experiences of the United States Japan France Canada Germany Denmark Italy and Australia with four comparative essays that shed light on the cultural institutional and economic dimensions of the HIV/blood disaster.