Current Petitions

PE1204, from Jessie Colson, on behalf of the Richard Colson Severe Aplastic Anemia Fund, calls on the Parliament to urge the Government to recognise and promote the life-saving impacts that bone marrow testing and donation can have on people with life-threatening illnesses, and to provide adequate funding to the Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service to support bone marrow services and encourage more donors.The petition has been discussed previously. Richard Colson's father is with us today, as is the constituency member who has supported the petition, Michael McMahon. I invite Michael to say a few words.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to return to the committee to discuss the petition—in happier times, I am pleased to report. The previous time I was here, there was the prospect that Richard Colson may have found a match, which is what his family had hoped would happen as part of the campaign. I am glad to be able to say that he got that match—he had his transplant on Thursday, and so far the signs are positive. The family want more people to enjoy the same opportunity. They have worked closely with, and value the work of, organisations such as the Anthony Nolan Trust and ScotBlood. That has never been in question. What is required—and this is what the petition is about—is an expansion in the number of bone marrow and cord blood donations, for which there is such great demand. Only 6 or 7 per cent of the Scottish population give blood. That means that there is an untapped resource of about 90 per cent of the population. The family's campaign has been aimed at increasing the availability of blood transfusions and allowing donations to be tested to find out about compatibility, which would help people such as Richard.I am here to thank everyone for the support that they have given the petition so far, for asking the relevant questions and for highlighting the issues that face the many families who, like the Colsons, are affected by illnesses that require such treatment. I ask the committee to continue its consideration of the petition, with a view to finding out how the service, which is resource intensive, can be made available to more people. A commitment needs to be made. Education is fine. The service is delivering what it can to the maximum with the resources that are available to it. We need to find imaginative ways of expanding what is available so that more people can benefit in the way that the Colson family have.

The committee hopes that Richard is doing well and that the transplant is a big success. It would be traumatic for any family to face what the Colson family have faced and at the same time to run a campaign for Richard and other families that are in the same circumstances. We wish them well.Members have some suggestions on how to deal with the petition.

That is absolutely right. Everyone is doing the best that they can with what they have at their disposal, but everyone agrees that the pie—the resources that are available—must be made bigger so that more can be done. How much more could be done if GPs were involved? How much more could be done if the people who take blood samples encouraged those from whom they took them to consider having them tested to find out about compatibility? There are options available if, as you say, we can get more people talking to one another about how to make best use of work that, in many cases, is already being done; it is a question of going beyond the minimum. Blood samples and bone marrow donations are being taken, but that is as far as it goes. The idea behind the campaign is to widen the availability of information about compatibility with people who need donations.

Has the Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service updated its webpage to provide information on the issue?

As of now, there has been no change in the information that is available. We can pursue that, given the commitment that was made to provide specific information by the end of April.We want to keep the petition open so that we can pursue those issues. Nigel Don has made an extremely constructive suggestion about pulling the key agencies together to resolve some of the outstanding issues. As always in the health service, the challenge will be around the resources that are available. The petition is about ensuring that we work better to identify additional resources or to utilise existing resources more intelligently so that money for the work that we are talking about can be released.We wish the family—and Richard, in particular—well. All our thoughts and prayers are with him.