Redressing the balance: Bruce Norval

Abstract

M onday 24th September 2018 was the first day of the preliminary hearings of the UK Infected Blood Inquiry. Two earlier inquiries, dismissed as whitewashes, failed to provide answers and committed campaigners had now been rewarded. The Inquiry would examine the circumstances in which people under the care of the National Health Service (NHS) were given blood and blood products contaminated with HIV and hepatitis viruses, and possibly Creuzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD); the impact on those infected and affected; the nature, adequacy and timeliness of the response from agencies involved; to what extent individuals may have been misled and denied treatment; and whether those agencies and individuals covered up the facts. The first three days were held in public, given over to opening statements that included witness accounts from people with haemophilia and their families. Their stories are profoundly moving. The Inquiry is truly an historic step towards accountability for the government, the NHS, health professionals and all involved in haemophilia care in the UK decades since 1970. The man who worked for many years to make this a reality is Bruce Norval. Bruce was born in Edinburgh in 1965. At age three he was admitted to hospital with bleeding from a fall; after three months on the ward, he was diagnosed with haemophilia B. It did not make much difference to him at the time.