By Shan Juan (China Daily)
Updated: 2007-09-15 08:49

Haemophilia sufferers in China are facing a severe nationwide plasma-derived product shortage for treatment, a leading doctor for blood diseases at the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, said.

To safeguard and save the lives of China's roughly 100,000 haemophiliacs, Dr Yang Renchi called on the government to give the green light to resume plasma imports.

"It's the high time for the government to consider to ease a two-decade-long ban on all imported blood and plasma-derived products," he said.

Imports would also include the plasma-derived clotting factor VIII product, he added.

Sufferers of the life-threatening genetic blood disorder can experience prolonged and occasionally excessive hemorrhages.

China imposed the embargo in 1986 after the first HIV infection through imported factor VIII was detected around 1983.

"Although there are still risks of transmission of blood-borne pathogens, strict measures designed to inactivate the virus have greatly improved the safety of foreign blood products these days, " Yang said.

Such disinfection measures, according to industry insiders, are widely applied at China's 33 blood production companies.

Other experts, including patients have echoed Yang's call to lift the import ban.

"The situation is really harsh and pressing," Chu Yuguang, a Beijing-based haemophiliac and director with the Haemophilia Home of China, a volunteer civil society of more than 3,000 patients, said.

The shortfall is so dire, current supplies could only help just 5 percent of patients, he said.

Some industry insiders also blamed the recent strengthened controls by authorities on blood plasma collection centers. Many establishments considered sub-standard have been shut down.

The government in response is busy considering countermeasures.

"(The government) indeed understands the pain of patients," Yan Jiangying, spokeswoman with the top drug watchdog, said.

However, she doubted the possibility of the embargo being loosened very soon. She instead appealed for more people to donate blood, as this was the only way to solve the problem.

Chu called on the government to deal with this "pressing issue" as soon as possible.