Safety of Blood Products Derived from Plasma Pools: The Positive Impact of Anti-HCV Screening on the Quality of Such Products

PCR Screening in the Routine of Blood Banking of the German Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service of Baden-Würtemberg

“…The Blood Transfusion Service of Baden-Württemberg (420,00 donations/year) introduced, in January 1997, the screening of plasma minipools (n = 96) by PCR for detection of HBV, HCV and HIV nucleic acids. From a previous study on larger plasma pools (n = 5,000) derived from this blood donor population, it was known that the introduction of anti-HCV screening had a positive effect on the viral safety of these pools [3]. PCR screening was introduced stepwise, beginning with the testing of blood donations collected by the blood transfusion institute in Ulm (~800 donations/day) in January 1997.…”

Pressure cycling technology:a novel approach to virus inactivation in plasma

“…The risk associated with the transfusion of blood and blood components has been significantly re‐ duced by the screening of donors and the testing of blood components for specific pathogens 1 . There are, however, several limitations to screening: 1) current tests may miss certain infectious units, particularly during the early phase of infection before seroconversion; 2) effective tests are not available for all known pathogens; 3) newly emerging viruses or microorganisms cannot be detected 2 ; and 4) the marginal benefit‐to‐cost ratio becomes prohibitively high for new tests 3 .…”