'We need action, not words': blood scandal victim Derek Martindale

Derek Martindale, who grew up in York and went to Northfield School in Acomb, told The Press that the report published today by Sir Brian Langstaff, the chairman of the Infected Blood Inquiry, had given those affected by the scandal ‘all that we have hoped for’.

He said: “It (the report) is damning, and truthful, and absolutely necessary.”

Asked whether government should apologise for the historic failures, he added: “We want an apology with action, yes. An apology with a commitment that they are going to do something.”

Sir Brian’s 2,527-page report published today documents a ‘catalogue of failures’ which had ‘catastrophic’ consequences, not only among people infected with contaminated blood and blood products, but also their loved ones.

More than 30,000 people were infected with deadly viruses while they were receiving NHS care between the 1970s and 1990s, in a disaster described by inquiry chairman Sir Brian Langstaff as a 'calamity'.

The scandal ‘could largely have been avoided’ and there was a ‘pervasive’ cover-up to hide the truth, his inquiry concluded.

Deliberate attempts were made to conceal the disaster, including evidence of Whitehall officials destroying documents, and patients were knowingly exposed to unacceptable risks of infection, the probe found.

Derek Martindale (middle) and his brothers Richard (right) and Stephen (left) with their grandparents at their sister Susan's wedding three months before Richard's death (Image: Derek Martindale)

No compensation has yet been announced – that is expected in the next day or two - but the Press understands ministers have earmarked around £10 billion.

That compensation should be paid to all those who were ‘infected and affected’, said Derek, who was one of the first people to give evidence to the infected blood hearing in 2019.

He stressed it was not for him to say how much compensation should be given.

“But it should go to the infected and the affected – all those who lost parents or lost children. They still haven’t received any compensation,” he said.

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Derek, who worked as a civil servant at Imphal Barracks in Fulford before moving to London in 1987, is a haemophiliac who developed HIV and hepatitis C after being treated with infected blood.

On Friday September 13, 1985 – a day he will never forget – his family doctor told him: “You’ve got a year to live. Don’t tell anybody.” He was 23.

Derek’s Hepatitis C was cleared up following a regime of chemotherapy treatment – but he remains on medication for HIV to this day.

His brother Richard, also a haemophiliac, was less fortunate. He tested positive for HIV which advanced to AIDS, and died in 1990, one month before his 24th birthday.

Richard Martindale in the 1980s (Image: Derek Martindale)

Those responsible for the infected blood scandal killed his brother, Derek says – and also profoundly impacted his own life.

But Derek, now 60, says he refuses to let the anger consume him.

“There are individuals who were consumed with anger, and for whom it took over their lives,” he said.

“But I thought ‘what’s the point’? I could spend my life consumed with anger, or I could get on with my life.”

Derek, who is married with a grown-up son, makes clear it is not the NHS itself he blames but successive governments who tried to cover up the scandal or took no action to resolve it.

There were ‘some rotten apples’ working in the NHS at the time, he says. “But the NHS continues to treat me for haemophilia and HIV, and the people I have dealt with I have nothing but respect for.”

It is successive governments that he blames. “I have no faith in any of them. It has taken 40 years for one of them to say that they will do something, rather than kicking the can down the road.”

Action is long overdue, he said. “You see supermarkets which issue product recalls.

“They don’t wait until someone gets sick. They identify the risk and pull the product. That’s what should have been done.”

Sir Brian’s report has made a series of recommendations – not only on compensation, but on how lessons can be learned from the disaster and incorporated into medical training, on strengthening duty of candour regulations, and on addressing a culture of 'defensiveness'.

It is vital that those recommendations are now acted upon, Derek said.

Scale of infected blood scandal was 'horrifying'

THE sheer scale of what happened in the infected blood scandal was ‘horrifying’ says the chairman of the inquiry into the disaster.

Sir Brian Langstaff said in his report published today that 3,000 people had already died as a result. But the contaminated blood disaster is ‘still happening’, he added, because patients who suffered ‘life-shattering’ infections continue to die every week.

Sir Brian’s report says that survivors were forced to battle for decades to uncover the truth.

As the scandal unfolded, government decision-making was slow and protracted and a 'doctor knows best' belief delayed action to protect patients, he says.

Medics lost sight of what was known about the risks of infection and patients could have received safer care.

Some patients were ‘betrayed’ because tests were carried out on them without their knowledge or consent.

Sir Brian said in a statement: "This disaster was not an accident. The infections happened because those in authority - doctors, the blood services and successive governments - did not put patient safety first. The response of those in authority served to compound people's suffering.”

Key failures highlighted in Sir Brian’s report include:

• A failure to act over risks linked to contaminated blood - some of which were known before the NHS was established in 1948.
• The slowness of the response to the scandal; for instance, it was apparent by mid-1982 that there was a risk that the cause of Aids could be transmitted by blood and blood products but the government failed to take steps to reduce that risk.
• Patients and the wider public were given false reassurances.
• There were delays informing people about their infections - sometimes for years - and they were told in "insensitive" and "inappropriate" ways.
• People with bleeding disorders were treated without proper consent and research was carried out on them without their knowledge.