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Doctors fear for blood supply following screening cut proposal

Christian Wenande
September 7th, 2016


This article is more than 8 years old.

Doing away with NAT screening could seriously compromise Denmark’s ability to handle unforeseen virus outbreaks

Making cuts? Not the NAT please (photo: Aarhus University Hospital)

The government’s proposal to axe the hospitals’ preferred method of screening blood will risk leading to a diminished supply.

Cutting the NAT screening is part of the government’s budget proposal for 2017 and could lead to a weakened emergency preparedness against foreign viruses such as Zika and the West Nile, several doctors warn.

Getting rid of it would force blood banks to establish long quarantines for blood donors because the old serological screenings can only reveal the presence of a virus in the blood two weeks after infection, while the NAT screening does it in days.

“We are concerned for the safety of the blood supply,” Christian Erikstrup, a doctor at the Clinical Immunological Department at Aarhus University Hospital, told Ingeniøren newspaper.

“We risk not having enough blood donors. The expiration date of blood platelets is one week, and it’s 35 days for red blood cells. We can’t manage tapping a load of blood before the summer holidays and then waiting for people to come back and then having a month’s quarantine.”

READ MORE: Denmark lacking male blood donors

Established in 2009
The government’s proposal to cut the NAT screening – which tests for viruses, DNA and RNA, including HIV and hepatitis B and C – would lead to savings of about 30 million kroner annually.

But should a new and unknown infection turn up in Denmark, the health system won’t be able to react as quickly without the screening.

“The test is also an emergency tool that is set up to handle catastrophe situations,” said Dr Betina Samuelsen Sørensen, the head of the Danish advocacy organisation for clinical immunology (DSKI).

“We have to be able to meet the challenge of a new and unforeseen situation, and the blood banks can’t do that should the NAT screening be removed.”

The NAT screening was introduced in 2009 in response to two Danes being infected with HIV through blood donations. Since then, the screening has caught one case of hepatitis C, zero cases of HIV and 17 cases of hepatitis B.


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A survey carried out by Megafon for TV2 has found that 71 percent of parents have handed over children to daycare in spite of them being sick.

Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

“I think it is absolutely crazy. It simply cannot be that a child goes to school sick and plays with lots of other children. Then we are faced with the fact that they will infect the whole institution,” said FOLA chair Signe Nielsen.

Pill pushers
At the Børnehuset daycare institution in Silkeborg a meeting was called where parents were implored not to bring their sick children to school.

At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

Parents sick and tired
Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”