Following the closure of the Thunder Bay Plasma Donor Clinic this week — the last of its kind in Canada — a petition is being circulating urging the Ontario government to use its influence to pursue Canadian Blood Services to increase the Canadian content in its blood plasma products.
CBS had originally agreed to do as much back in 2004, when the deputy ministers asked that the content of intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) be increased from 24 per cent to 40 per cent within four years. Today Canadian content is at 25 per cent as CBS shutters its Canadian plasma collection centre.
CBS is replacing Canadian plasma with imported U.S. FDA approved plasma product. U.S. FDA plasma was at the heart of the tainted blood scandal in the early 1990s. The U.S. FDA had approved exports of infected plasma extracted from Arkansas prisoners. 95 per cent of Canadian hemophiliacs were infected with hepatitis C, leading to the Krever Inquiry.
Help us get signatures in your community! Download the PDF petition here: CBS Petition Ontario.
A similiar petition is also being drafted for the Federal Minister of Health.
OPSEU Diablogue 