Friends of Medicare says for-profit plasma plans bad for Albertans

By GILLIAN SLADE on July 21, 2020.

gslade@medicinehatnews.com@MHNGillianSlade

Friends of Medicare is sounding an alarm about a private member’s bill tabled in the legislature this month regarding blood donations.

Tany Yao, MLA for Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo, introduced the legislation called Bill 204 – Voluntary Blood Donations Repeal Act, to repeal Bill 3, which was enacted by the NDP in 2017.

Yao claims the repeal will help patients by making the province’s plasma supply less dependent on the international supply, which he says can be unreliable.

The NDP enacted Bill 3 to ensure a healthy stock of voluntary blood donors for Canadian Blood Services.

Sandra Azocar, executive director FoM, says Bill 204 will result in CBS having to compete with private companies and ultimately create a “competitive market” for blood products.

FoM has in the past spoken out about the perils of paying people to donate blood.

“This government is making it clear that they have no issues with opening up the veins of Albertans to this huge, exploitative, multi-billion dollar global market, without even a cursory concern for the impact this will have on our blood supply chain and patients,” said Azocar.

Drew Barnes, MLA for Cypress-Medicine Hat, says that each year Alberta spends $144 million importing plasma from the U.S. where Americans who donate the plasma are paid to do so.

“This is because Alberta cannot meet its own needs,” said Barnes. “In addition to keeping this revenue in Alberta, bio/pharma companies may develop in Alberta.”

However, FoM points out that private blood brokers make their profit on the international market, where they compete to sell their plasma to the highest bidder.

Azokar says in a press release that at the moment Canadian Plasma Resources, a company that attempted to open in Alberta before 2017, sell its plasma to Biotest AG, a global pharmaceutical company owned by a Chinese company. The concern is that if CPR opens here we could be selling the Canadian supply on the global market.

Yao tabled Bill 204 on July 8 and it could be approved in the fall session of the legislature at the earliest.

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