Government advisers say anyone who had a blood transfusion before 1992 should be tested for hepatitis C, a serious liver infection.
A Public Health Service blood advisory committee said Tuesday there should be a massive campaign to get out the word to the public, including advertising to tell people without insurance where they can find free testing at public clinics.In addition, blood banks nationwide must check their records for any donor who has tested positive for hepatitis C since 1992, and then trace records of any recipients of blood from that donor dating back to 1987, the panel recommended. Those recipients must be notified by a letter that they should be tested for the infection.
An estimated 290,000 Americans got hepatitis C from transfusions before the first tests for the virus were created in 1990. And that first test needed improvements, so it wasn't until mid-1992 that blood banks had highly effective screening.