‘I’ve made every second count’: one man’s search for justice through the infected blood scandal

Mark Ward, a victim of the infected blood scandal that has killed so many, has fought all his life for truth and acknowledgement of what happened to him and so many of his peers. Now, at last, his voice is being heard

Mark Ward should be long dead. He ought to have been a goner decades ago. “Somebody dies of infected blood every two days,” he explains, “and every time they do, it’s a step closer to being my turn.” He delivers this nonchalantly. “I have to live in the fast lane, because the clock is ticking and mine is running extra fast. I’ve got this far on borrowed time: at some point my luck will run out.” Ward’s husband Richard wanders through their living room – briefly, they share a hand squeeze and smile. “So, usually, I’m asked to look miserable and solemn in photographs. It’s always darkness, death and destruction. It made a nice change this morning to be allowed to look happy for your pictures.”

In the 1970s and 80s, more than 30,000 British patients were treated with contaminated blood products teaming with harmful pathogens – a lethal scandal on a national scale. Ward, 55, a haemophiliac, was one of 6,000 bleeding-disorder patients. He was infected with HIV, multiple strains of hepatitis, cytomegalovirus, Epstein-Barr virus, parvovirus B19 and others. To date, at least 3,000 people have died because of a litany of institutional failures, covered up for a generation.