If it had "put the effort into it" the BTSB could have supplied treaters with locally made cryoprecipitate in the early 1980s rather than imported concentrates to service the needs of haemophiliacs, the tribunal heard yesterday.
However, Prof Ian Temperley, former medical director of the National Haemohpilia Treatment Centre, said he did not recall such a proposal being discussed at the time.
He was being questioned on why the BTSB chose not to follow the route of other blood banks, such as that in Finland which in 1979 was moving towards the use of freeze-dried cryo, made from local plasma, for home treatment.
It is understood there have only been two cases of HIV in the haemophilia community in Finland, both of whom had received treatment outside the State. In contrast, up to a quarter of the Irish haemophilia community was infected by the virus, the majority through imported commercial concentrates.
Prof Temperley said Finland was a "unique country" which had a "very determined" method of dealing with its problems. He said other countries were of the same way of thinking as him at the time that concentrates were better than freeze-dried cryo.
Concentrates, he said, had been shown to improve the quality of life of haemophiliacs as they were much easier to administer. If they had been withdrawn, people who had been using them would have been "clamouring" to get them back.
Earlier, the tribunal heard that the pharmaceutical firm Travenol suggested, as early as 1974, supplying blood products to the board in return for plasma. The option was not seriously considered at the time, he said.
The tribunal has heard that 10 years later, in 1984, the BTSB undertook a "custom fractionation" arrangement with Travenol under which clotting agents were made from Irish plasma overseas at a profit for the board.
It was not clear from documentation whether Travenol envisaged a similar arrangement in 1974, said counsel for the tribunal, Mr John Finlay SC, as the company did not indicate whether it would return products made from the Irish plasma or overseas plasma.
It has been suggested to the tribunal that had the BTSB engaged in custom fractionation at an earlier date, like its counterparts in Northern Ireland, fewer infections would have occurred.
