Victim of Britain's infected blood scandal recalls horrifying moment he was told he 'might only live for a few more years' aged 15 - after doctors infected him with HIV

Daily Mail​

20-05-2025

A man has revealed the horrifying moment he was given a HIV diagnosis aged 15 after unknowingly being given infected blood as a child.
Adrian Goodyear was among the haemophiliac children sent to specialist boarding school Lord Mayor Treloar College in Hampshire for a 'normal childhood' but instead became a victim of medical research.
The final report of the Infected Blood Inquiry, released last year, found that medical staff used children at the Hampshire school in the 1970s and '80s as 'objects for research' and ignored the risk of pupils contracting hepatitis and HIV.
Of the pupils who attended the Lord Mayor Treloar College, 'very few escaped being infected' and of the 122 pupils with haemophilia that attended the school between 1970 and 1987, only 30 are still alive.
Pupils at the school in Hampshire were given treatment at an on-site NHS centre. But it was later found that many pupils with the condition had been treated with plasma blood products which were infected with hepatitis and HIV.
Inquiry chair Sir Brian Langstaff, concluded that children at Treloar's were treated with multiple commercial concentrates that were known to carry higher risks of infection and that staff favoured the 'advancement of research' above the best interests of the children.
Adrian has banded together with a group of three other former pupils to highlight the atrocities they experienced throughout their childhood in a new ITV documentary, The British Blood Scandal: Poisoned at School, which airs on ITV tonight at 9pm.
Talking in the show, Adrian recalled the moment a doctor called a group of students to the NHS centre and informed them of their diagnoses in a carefree manner.
'We were 15 and we were asked to go to the haemophilia centre,' Adrian recalled, continuing, 'One of the nurses was tearful, really tearful, and that made us really uncomfortable because nurses don't cry really.'
He told how the doctor got on with the diagnoses 'fairly quick'. Adrian continued, 'He said that we all had an issue with HIV.
'He lifted his left hand and went round the room, and he said, 'You have it, you haven't, you have, you haven't, you have,' and I was the one at the end. I got HIV'.
'One lad said, 'How long have we got?' He [the doctor] said, 'Two to three years, but we'll do our best for you'.'
Elsewhere, another pupil called Gary Webster shared his reaction to receiving the news, 'I think I laughed, probably a nervous laugh or something, we just shook our heads and went 'Oh, ok', and that was it, 'next please' sort of thing and we just went back to school'.
'My parents weren't told, it had come out of the blue. I left it until I left college and then I told them.'
The documentary follows Adrian, Gary, and two other pupils, Richard Warwick and Steve Nicholls, on their fight for justice in the lead up to the final report of the public inquiry.
They recall how, in the late 1970s, an NHS haemophilia unit was opened at their college, which meant they and their friends could receive an injectable treatment – Factor VIII – on site, which was branded as revolutionary.
The pupils and their parents thought Factor Concentrates were a miracle cure, but they later discovered they were a 'death sentence' for many and led to the co-infection of around 1,250 haemophiliacs nationwide with HIV and Hepatitis C, and another 2,400 to 5,000 people developing Hepatitis C on its own, ITV reported.
Steve said: 'I feel like we were groomed to conform, we were given all these fantastic opportunities, that's what we'd focus on.
'We'd love to play for six or eight hours a day, go sailing, go fishing, come back and hold our arm out for half an hour to have an injection, it was a trade-off and it was the norm most days. We're not talking have an injection every fortnight, it was most days.'
Gary added 'If you did miss it [the medication], sick bay would then report it to your housemaster and you got punished.'
Inquiry chair Sir Brian Langstaff's report found that from 1977, medical research was carried out at Treloar's 'to an extent which appears unparalleled elsewhere' and that children were treated unnecessarily with concentrates, particularly commercial ones rather than alternative safer treatments.
He said: 'The pupils were often regarded as objects for research, rather than first and foremost as children whose treatment should be firmly focused on their individual best interests alone. This was unethical and wrong.'
His report found there is 'no doubt' that the healthcare professionals at Treloar's were aware of the risks of virus transmission through blood and blood products.
He wrote: 'Not only was it a pre-requisite for research, a fundamental aspect of Treloar's, but knowledge of the risks is displayed in what the clinicians there wrote at the time.
WHAT IS HAEMOPHILIA?
Haemophilia is a rare condition that affects the blood's ability to clot. It's usually inherited, and most people who have it are male.
Normally, when you cut yourself, substances in the blood known as clotting factors combine with blood cells called platelets to make the blood sticky. This makes the bleeding stop eventually.
People with haemophilia don't have as many clotting factors as there should be in the blood. This means they bleed for longer than usual.
There are several different types of haemophilia. The following two are the most common:
Haemophilia A (Classic Haemophilia), caused by a lack or decrease of clotting factor VIII.
Haemophilia B (Christmas Disease), caused by a lack or decrease of clotting factor IX.
There's no cure for haemophilia, but treatment usually allows a person with the condition to enjoy a good quality of life.
Genetically engineered clotting factor medicines are used to prevent and treat prolonged bleeding. These medicines are given as an injection.
Haemophilia occurs in about one of every 5,000 male births, according to the CDC. Currently, about 20,000 people in the US and 400,000 worldwide are living with the disorder.
In the UK, figures suggest there are 2,000 sufferers of the condition.
Source - NHS
'Practise at Treloar's shows that the clinical staff were well aware that their heavy use of commercial concentrate risked causing Aids,' he continued.
Despite knowledge of the dangers, clinicians proceeded with higher-risk treatments in attempts to further their research, the report concluded.
Sir Brian wrote: 'It is difficult to avoid a conclusion that the advancement of research was favoured above the immediate best interest of the patient.'
He continued: 'In conclusion, the likeliest reason for the Treloar's treatments having the catastrophic results they did is that clinicians were seduced by wishing to believe, against available information, that intensive therapy might produce better overall results; by the desirability of convenience in administration rather than the safety of treatment and by ignoring some of the treatment implications of the research projects they wished to pursue.'
The Lord Mayor Treloar College, which has since been rebranded as Treloar's, was established in 1908 as a school which gave disabled children a better chance to receive an education alongside any medical treatment they might need.
It was originally a boys' school but then merged with a girls' school in 1978 to become co-educational.
From 1956, boys with haemophilia began attending the school. After it was discovered pupils had been given infected blood plasma, the NHS clinic at the school closed.
The report also highlighted that parents and children at Treloar's were given little information about their care and the related risks, and that parental consent was not sought regarding the use of different treatments.
Sir Brian wrote: 'The evidence before the inquiry suggests, overwhelmingly, that there was no general system or process for telling parents of the risks of viral infection. Nor were pupils told.
'Parents were not given details, nor even core information, about their children at Treloar's for haemophilia.
'They were not told, for instance, that despite their home clinician's recommendations as to the treatment product, the pupils were being given a range of different concentrates.'
In many cases, the report stated, research was conducted on patients, including children, without consent or consent of their parents and without informing them of the risks.
'They gave a consistent account that there had been no meaningful consultation with their parents, or with them,' Sir Brian continued.
Treloar's told ITV: 'We sincerely apologise to our former students and their families who were so devastatingly infected and affected by the infected blood scandal. The treatment by clinicians of pupils at Treloar's in the 1970s and 1980s was unethical and wrong.'
The British Blood Scandal: Poisoned at School is available to watch on ITV1 on Tuesday at 9pm and ITVX.