A 41 YEAR OLD woman who was infected with hepatitis C through anti D manufactured at Pelican House, told the tribunal of inquiry yesterday that she would "most likely face premature death".
Ms Paula Kealy, who has three children, also spoke of seeing her friend, Mrs Brigid McCole, die from the disease last October. "It was like looking into a mirror down the road for me. A piece of me died. It was just like that for every woman in Positive Action," she said.
Ms Jane O'Brien, chairwoman of Positive Action, said: "Brigid's death was like a lightning bolt. There was numbness and there was anger ... there was terrible sadness and there was fear that was unknown before this. We realised that despite the best medical attention people could die from hepatitis".
She told the tribunal Positive Action began as a support group but grew into a lobbying force as the extent and causes of the disease became known.
What was considered "an act of God," she said, was regarded as a mistake when members realised the BTSB had been told Patient X had hepatitis.
The revelations were "absolutely staggering". "That began reopening the whole series of questions about why this happened. It added to the whole incredulity of why this happened, that people who were supposed to do good in the BTSB had done such wrong."
Ms Kealy said she was diagnosed with chronic active hepatitis C in May, 1994. She was treated with anti D following the birth of her second child in 1977. She would be lucky if she got another 10 years without experiencing the complications arising from liver breakdown. She was finding it difficult to face the chronic illness and premature death before her through no fault of her own.
She underwent Interferon medication for 12 months, injecting herself three times weekly, and experiencing progressively worse side effects of flu like symptoms, temperature changes and fatigue, spending every second day in bed. The treatment was ineffective.
Ms O'Brien received contaminated anti D in 1989 and 1990. But she and others like her considered themselves lucky because they had a low level of hepatitis C antibodies.