ADVICE three years ago from a senior civil servant that a tribunal be set up to investigate the hepatitis C scandal was not accepted by the then Minister for Health, Mr Howlin.
Giving evidence to the Tribunal of Inquiry yesterday, Mr Donal Devitt, an assistant secretary at the Department of Health since 1990, also said it was during hearings of the tribunal that his Department first became aware patient Y had jaundice when plasma was taken from her in 1989 by the Blood Transfusion Service Board (BTSB) for the manufacture of anti D.
He added that nine women were given suspect anti D after the stock was ordered to be withdrawn.
On February 17th, 1994, when the BTSB first informed the Department of the infection of women by anti D, Mr Devitt's instincts told him this was "the biggest medical disaster in the history of the State".
At a meeting later that month, which was attended by Mr Howlin, his adviser Dr Tim Collins, and then secretary of the Department Mr John Hurley, Mr Devitt "expressed strongly" his view that a statutory tribunal should be set up. He spoke of the difficulty of getting information from the BTSB, and the changing nature of the information that was available. He told the meeting of his "reservations about the Expert Group, or any forum which didn't have compellability".
However "the decision of the Minister was very clear," he recalled. Mr Howlin indicated though that he had "an open mind, if the Expert Group was not successful, to revisit the issue". Mr Devitt remembered the Minister saying, "in a phrase popular at the time", that the Expert Group "may have to be ratcheted up to a tribunal of inquiry".
When it was put to him by Mr Rory Brady, counsel for the tribunal, that Dr Collins had supplied a statement indicating he did note recall any "senior or junior person" in the Department proposing that a tribunal be set up, Mr Devitt said he had "a very, very clear recollection" of what he had said at that meeting.
The date was probably February 28th, 1994. The meeting had taken place on receipt of a letter from the BTSB, dated February 25th, which revealed "the staggering fact" that patient X had an episode of jaundice early in her treatment.
The meeting in the Department on February 17th, with Dr Terry Walsh, Mr Ted Keyes and Mr Sean Hanratty, of the BTSB, was "very difficult" and lasted "for a few hours", Mr Devitt continued.
Then there was the additional information in the letter of February 25th concerning patient X. If the BTSB report of February 17th had been "an atomic bomb, then the letter of February 25th was a nuclear bomb," he said. On its receipt he asked Ms Dolores Moran to look at the legislation covering tribunals, as preparation for making such a proposal to Mr Howlin.
On the withdrawal of anti D, he considered "in retrospect we should have instructed them (BTSB) to physically go out and collect it (from the beginning)." The Department had been told that the BTSB "had put its standard operating procedure into effect," that all relevant hospitals and homes had been contacted.
The BTSB had "a clear legal responsibility" in the matter, he said. The Department was "being constantly reassured" by the BTSB. However, reports began to come in of some of the suspect anti D stock still being used.
