The Greek Ministry of Health intends to commercialize “blood” and “plasma”

Greek Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis intends to commercialize donated blood and plasma by allowing private blood collection centers to operate.

He is currently preparing legislation to allow the commercial use of blood and plasma in private centers, where donors would also be compensated. An exclusive report by news site in.gr revealed on Wednesday that the Ministry of Health has given the green light to the creation of private centers and a bill has been prepared to do so, essentially turning blood into a commercial product.

As in.gr reports, the bill provides for the extension of healthcare privatization to blood. Compensation to donors is tax-free and non-withdrawable, and is aimed at reimbursing work time lost during blood donation.

It should be noted that the competence and responsibility for the collection, disposal and management of blood and its components for transfusion or fractionation lies with the National Blood Donation Center and blood centers for donation services in hospitals with legislation from 2005.

In accordance with the bill, municipalities and churches, legal entities under private law, as well as non-governmental organizations of a non-profit nature will be able to establish private blood collection centers for transfusion or fractionation, as well as plasma collection centers for fractionation.

The bill is allegedly based on the European regulation on “substances of human origin” approved at the end of April. However, “the corresponding bill is far from the regulations EUwhich must be applied”, emphasizes in.gr.

The European regulation aims to uniformly manage blood, plasma, tissue and cells for transplantation in Europe, while the Greek Ministry of Health bill only concerns the regulation of the commercial activities of companies that will produce medicines using plasma collected from Greek donors as “raw materials” . In this regard, the government plans to remove responsibility from the National Blood Center (EKEA) and transfer it to a new independent body that will be created. The bill is still being developed.

PS. Of course, neither municipalities, nor churches, nor any other institutions can afford to maintain a fully equipped blood bank and laboratory, so most likely they will be judged as “blood collection centers.” It is not yet clear whether these products will be sold to pharmaceutical companies and at what price, whether they will be able to be purchased by patients in need of blood and plasma, and what compensation will be for donations.

As far as I know, government employees will get 3 days off for donating blood. In contrast, private sector workers will be able to return to work immediately after drinking a glass of orange juice.

Athens News will keep you updated when the bill is introduced in parliament.

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