I lost my dad at eight years old after he was infected with AIDS from contaminated blood… and it was our family’s ‘dirty little secret’
A DAD-OF-FOUR who lost his father when he was just eight years old after he was infected with AIDS from contaminated blood has recalled how he had to keep the cause of his death hidden like a "dirty little secret".
Chris Smith, 39, from Cambridgeshire, told how his grieving family were forced to sell his dad's prized possessions in order to survive - something he admitted "broke his heart".
An official inquiry opened on Monday into the deaths of more than 2,400 people in the 1970s and 1980s who were given blood products infected with hepatitis viruses and HIV.
Chris, who is at the trial this week, said he's happy it's finally taking place, but skeptical about the outcome.
"All the money in the world is never going to bring back the sound of my dad’s voice, or enable me to have a cuddle with him and be with him again," he said.
"But I think all of us need some form of closure. You can’t pen around something that is classed as the biggest treatment disaster in NHS history, and have no accountability attached to it in any way shape or form."
Chris's father Raymond Smith, who was just 32 when he died, was a severe haemophiliac, an inherited condition that affects the blood's ability to clot.
In late 1979 he began receiving Factor VIII, an essential blood-clotting protein, which was imported from the US as the NHS was in short supply.
But the clotting factor products, supplied by the NHS in the 1970s and 80s, had often come from drug addicts and prostitutes, who donated blood for cash.
As a result of the tainted transfusions, Ray contracted Hepatitis B and later, HIV, which developed into full-blown AIDS.
He was one of the 2,400 people who died from their infections as a result of the contaminated blood.
Chris also lost his cousin, who was a haemophiliac too, 10 years later as a result of the Factor VIII scandal.
Speaking about losing his dad to AIDS in the 80s, Chris recalled how it was "easier" to lie and say his dad had died from cancer or as a result of a car accident.
"I couldn’t talk about it because of the stigma regarding AIDS back in the day, it was horrific," he said. "It was like a dirty little secret.
The HIV and Hepatitis C blood contamination disaster has been described as possibly the biggest NHS scandal in history...
The scandal was sparked by contaminated clotting factor products, which were supplied by the NHS in the 1970s and 80s.
Unlike regular blood donations, plasma products such as Factor VIII were often sourced from the United States and elsewhere.
The diseases came from high risk donors such as prostitutes and prisoners.
As many as 60,000 paid donors were used for one batch of blood products.
And it only took one infected donor to contaminate an entire batch and infect all the patients.
At the time, the NHS had stopped paying donors for whole blood donations.
But they were still sourcing Factor VIII under these methods, because of we had failed to produce enough samples here in Britain.
More than 2,400 people died as a result of the scandal with arpound 5,000 believed to have been infected with HIV and Hepatits.
"I remember going to school and we’d seen the AIDS adverts, and all the jokes among the kids were about AIDS.
"Kids are kids, and I was one of them, and I had to sit there and laugh and joke about it."
Chris said losing his dad caused his family to "fall apart", explaining: "At eight years old I had to grow up and become the man of the house to try to help and support mum.
"My brother was only 18 months when he died. He feels like he’s never had a dad.
"My dad was a successful businessman with two businesses. We ended up with nothing because the businesses all came down, the family broke down.
"It was horrific for mum. She’d be as strong as anything during the day and in front of everyone, but it was when everyone wasn’t around, me and my little brother were in bed, I would hear her crying most nights, trying to work out how we could keep the house that my dad bought, trying to work out how we were going to get through and earn money.
"We had to sell a lot of my dad’s stuff which broke my heart. His number plate, which was his pride and joy, his collection of Corgi toy cars; everything had to go to the auction to get sold because we were struggling to get by.
"In the end we had to sell the house and move to another one. It still breaks my heart now, I still have to go past that house and see it."
Chris said becoming a dad himself has helped him deal with his grief.
He explained: "Everything to do with fathers beforehand was negative for me. Watching stuff on TV scenes with a father and son would bring me to tears.
"I took my boy, who’s eight years old, to see Star Wars.
"Star Wars had always been mine and Dad’s little thing, and it was a good job it was in 3D and I had glasses on because as soon as that music came on I sat there, held his hand, and there were tears running down my face the whole way through it."
Chris told how Ray would self-inject with Factor VIII every few days from the late 1970s up until January 6 1986, when he passed away.
In late 1984, test results showed Ray had HIV, but doctors didn't alert the family until February 1985 and assured his mum, Wendy, it would not go to full-blown AIDS.
"He lost two stone in under two months," Chris recalled.
"I have this early memory of me going into the bathroom where dad was brushing his teeth.
"There was always blood, and he freaked out at me to get me out of the bathroom, and I always wondered why he got so cross. He wanted me away from the blood."
Ray became severely ill towards the end of 1985, and on January 6 he was admitted to hospital and put into isolation.
Chris said: "As it was full-blown AIDS I wasn’t allowed to go across and see him. Mum stayed with him for 24 hours holding his hand, sat there with him, and the following morning he died."
Two days after losing his dad, Chris recalled being dragged into hospital with his mum and little brother to be tested for AIDS.
He said from that young age, his mum had told him his dad had died from contaminated blood.
Five years later, after losing his grandmother, Chris began researching the scandal.
He explained: "I saw a video from America on YouTube called Rat of the Week in which an attorney explained that pharmaceutical companies were buying blood that was taken from prisons, Mexican borders, and they were unethically paying for it, so the blood quality that you were getting was really, really high risk.
"The American government had seen what was happening and stopped them from doing it, so then the pharmaceutical companies, having lots of stock, had to then get their money back sold it into the UK and Asia at a cut price.
"There is evidence to show that in the early 1980s, people warned our government what was happening.
"If that warning in 1983 was taken notice of, my dad could have still been here today. At that time Mum was pregnant and Dad wasn’t HIV positive.
"But I understand we ignored those warnings due to the commercial implications, whatever that means. It’s time that the truth came out."
Chilling testimonies from just a few of the thousands of victims caught up in tragic scandal
The chilling testimonies of just a few of the thousands of victims affected by the blood contamination scandal have been heard at a public inquiry.
In a video played at the inquiry in London on Monday, a man described how he felt 'everything ended' for him at the age of 43 when he discovered he was infected with hepatitis C as a child.
At the age of eight, he had been injected with blood products for a swollen knee that was misdiagnosed as haemophilia.
He added: "When they told me what they had done to me, I stood at a motorway bridge to jump off it - basically, that has been my life ever since.
"I lost everything, I lost my whole life the day I found out - everything ended."
Campaigner Mark Ward was just 14 when he found out he had HIV after being given contaminated blood at the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead, north London.
His video testimony revealed how he had been receiving tainted blood for more than a decade.
He said: "I was diagnosed at three years old with severe haemophilia, and therefore that is when the treatment started, so from that very first injection... that's when the infections began, so from the word go.
"With the contaminated blood scandal, I don't know where I fit into society…the downside of that is that you are constantly being judged, constantly trying to prove yourself, and within the family unit, it has destroyed us."
One widow revealed how her husband John, who was a severe haemophiliac, died of Aids in 1994, while also suffering from hepatitis C.
"I feel we have been treated very badly", she said. "Nobody has listened to us over the years, it is like knocking on a door and it never opening."
The woman, who did not give her name, said the diagnosis meant the pair were unable to continue their careers or the relationship they had previously.
Chris said it's incredibly emotional being at the trial surrounded by families who, like him, have suffered a devastating loss.
"You meet so many people that are total strangers to you – they could be infected by a blood transfusion, they could be haemophiliacs like my father, but it’s like we’re all one massive family," he explained.
"Because you’re all walked the same path, you feel like you know each other.
"It doesn’t matter what comes out of this, the biggest thing we need is the record putting straight, and everyone’s deaths registered correctly so that they actually count for something.
"These people were given an unfair death penalty – they didn’t deserve it. I still class myself as one of the lucky ones – we lost dad and my cousin, but when you hear stories like those of Lauren Palmer and Tony Farrugia, they’re horrific.
"You’re sat there wondering why it’s taken 33 years to get to this point."
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Of the patients infected with Hepatitis C and HIV, only 250 are still alive. On Monday Sir Brian Langstaff, chairman of the probe, said the number of those infected could go far beyond 25,000 as a victim branded the scandal "the worst tragedy in the history of the NHS".
We previously revealed dad-of-one Gary Webster, 52, was diagnosed at the age of 17 after being infected by contaminated blood at his Hampshire school.
He was one of 89 pupils infected with HIV and Hepatitis C by blood samples - and only 17 are still alive today.