A legal response to the issue of Safe Blood
1. This representation seeks to bring to the notice an issue of grave national importance and is an urgent demand for justice. This relates to the state of blood transfusion services in the country, and the need to conduct a review of the existing legislation and rules pertaining to the collection, storage, urgent supply and transfusion of blood and blood-products because of the difficulties encountered by both patients and medical service providers, particularly in rural areas. 2. Blood is an essential component of the body, which provides sustenance to life. ‘ Blood to the needy patients’ is a subject of human life and death. Blood for transfusion can either be made available through services of Blood banks or can be taken from a donor and after doing all the tests, directly given to the patient without “banking” or storing. This is termed as Unbanked Directed Blood Transfusion (“ UDBT ”). 3. The services of blood banks was started a