Cost was a factor in deciding which blood products were provided to haemophiliacs, the Lindsay tribunal heard yesterday.
Dr Emer Lawlor, a consultant haematologist and deputy national medical director of the BTSB, said haemophiliacs would require about 23,000 units of blood-clotting agent each year to prevent them bleeding to death. Different drug companies charged different prices per unit.
In a letter in 1979 Prof Ian Temperley, former director of the National Haemophilia Treatment Centre, told the late Dr Jack O'Riordan, then the BTSB's director, that Immuno, a German/ Austrian company, could provide factor 8 clotting agents generated in Europe for 11.9 pence per unit and generated in the US for 10.03 pence per unit.
Dr Lawlor said that as far as she knew Ireland received the Immuno product made from American plasma in 1980/81.
But Dr O'Riordan had been concerned about US-generated concentrates. He referred to "skid row types in the US and native populations in the Caribbean" when Travenol applied in 1973 for a licence for Haemophilia.
Dr Lawlor said there was concern in the 1970s that plasma used to produce factor concentrates was obtained not just in the US but from Third World countries. She added that it was very hard to get enough plasma at the time to produce concentrates without resorting to some form of paid donations.
She added that while people were aware of the risk of contracting hepatitis from factor concentrates in the late 70s, the general feeling was that they meant such an improvement in lifestyle that the risk was worth taking.