BAD BLOOD is a killer. Â鶹´«Ã½ recently outlined the dangers of transfusion-related acute lung injury (28 September 2002, p 6). TRALI is a rare but life-threatening condition that can result in acute respiratory failure within 4 hours of a transfusion. It is usually caused by a reaction to antibodies in the donor’s blood, which often turns out to have come from women who have had multiple births or people who have received blood from them. I asked Hazel Blears, the public health minister, what her department is doing about TRALI.
Blears said that out of 315 cases of…
