Blood: Animals
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the level of resilience of UK donor animal blood supply for diagnostic use across the NHS and the need for continuous supply.
Answered by Dr Zubir Ahmed
The Department recognises that animal blood-enriched agar is a critical component in microbiological diagnostics, and we recognise the importance of a sustainable and secure supply of such materials.
There are a number of suppliers on NHS Supply Chain’s current framework which offer donor animal blood supply for diagnostic use which support a level of resilience across England. To date there has been no issues with supply.
Where challenges in the supply of key products arise, these would be escalated to the Department’s National Supply Disruption Response, which works collaboratively with suppliers, manufacturers, and system partners to understand the nature of the disruption and to support appropriate mitigations.
The Department does not routinely centrally collect detailed information on the source of the licensed donor animal blood used in the manufacture of blood-enriched agar.
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