Clinical Review Group Report

Clinical Review of the Impacts of Hepatitis C:    Short Life Working Group Report for the Scottish Government:

 Informing Decision Making on Awards for People, without Advanced HCV Disease, who were Infected by Hepatitis C through NHS Blood Transfusion/Treatment with Blood Products, and for their Widows, Widowers or Civil Partners

May 2018

In mid-2017, the Scottish Government asked Professor David Goldberg, Health Protection Scotland, to establish and preside over an expert group to assess the health and wellbeing of individuals, chronically infected with hepatitis C virus (previously often known as Skipton “Stage One”) infection in Scotland through NHS blood transfusion/treatment with blood products, who had not progressed to advanced hepatitis C (previously often known as Skipton Fund “Stage Two”).

Patient representatives of  individuals infected through blood transfusion/treatment with blood products have argued that there is inequity regarding the Scottish Government’s financial support scheme’s annual payments because the current arrangements do not take into account the broader impacts of hepatitis C on health and wellbeing among individuals with chronic hepatitis C – impacts which can be harder to quantify in clinical terms. It is in this context that a clinical review of the impacts of hepatitis C on those affected by infected NHS blood has been established.

The report was published by Scottish Government on 11 July 2018.

As of that date the Scottish Health Secretary has yet to announce the Scottish Government’s repsonse to the report’s conclusions and formal recommendations. That response will also include a financial translation of the medical and other evidence detailed in the report and establish annual payments for stage1/chronically infected people or their widows/widowers.