Hep C campaigner to sit on blood board

THE woman who formed an organisation to represent women infected with hepatitis C through the anti-D blood product, has been appointed to the Board of the Irish Blood Transfusion Service.

Jane O'Brien, a former journalist and mother of two, formed the organisation Positive Action in 1994 after learning that she had been exposed to the contaminated blood product made by the Irish Blood Bank.

She is one of 70,000 women who were tested for the hepatitis C virus in 1994. Of those, 1,200 women were found to have been infected by the virus.