opinion: alberta and canada urgently need to maintain control of domestic blood supply

ucp mla tany yao wants to repeal the voluntary blood donations act in order to permit blood brokers to open blood-plasma collection centres in alberta.the law, which was passed in 2017, had broad support from the public because it protected the donor base in the province. since then, the alberta government, which is part of the pan-canadian provincial coalition that funds canadian blood services at arm’s length, approved a national plasma collection strategy. the goal: to ensure that canada becomes self-sufficient in blood plasma-based drugs in order to secure our supply chain and end dependency on u.s. imports. a large-scale plasma collection centre run by cbs will open in lethbridge later this year. every drop of plasma collected there will be guaranteed for a patient that needs it in alberta or other parts of canada, because we share blood and plasma across provincial lines.covid-19 has heightened the need for canada to secure domestic supply chains that are critical to our health and safety. a publicly controlled, national safe blood supply tops this list. private blood-plasma brokers do not help our supply chain in canada. in fact, they do the opposite: they deplete it. they take qualified donors away from the public system by luring them with cash incentives under the guise that they are benefiting canadians.a private plasma collector was permitted to open in saskatoon in 2016 and in moncton in 2017. since then, every bag of plasma collected by the company has been sold on the international market. contributions to our self-sufficiency? zero. it will be no different in alberta. why? because the company has sold their plasma to a fractionation facility in germany, which was recently sold to a chinese investment firm. in reality, paid blood brokers operating in alberta would be ceding control of their plasma supply, by proxy, to china.the argument for private blood brokers is put forward like this: let private industry take over plasma collection, they will pay people to sell their plasma like they do in the u.s., which has a huge plasma export business, jobs will come to the province, and canada will become self-sufficient. and none of it is true. canadian blood services had to go to the canadian senate last year to testify against the deeply flawed propaganda that blood-brokers pitch to government.it is also not illegal to compensate donors in alberta under the current law that mr. yao wants to repeal. it is illegal for private companies to pay donors to sell their plasma and turn over profits by selling our blood as a commodity. this is why pharmaceutical companies are trying to repeal the law. if they can control the supply chain, they can hold governments hostage with astronomical prices for plasma drugs. it’s a trick and a terrible business deal. we lose supply, we lose qualified donors, and we lose control over mitigating public health emergencies.controlling our plasma collection as a public resource means canada will eventually become less dependent on the for-profit blood industry. an industry which profits off of poor and vulnerable populations. an industry which is known for predatory and unethical business practices. countries around the world have launched large-scale domestic plasma collection strategies to become self-sufficient. the private blood broker industry is aware that they will lose control over the market in the coming years, and they are fighting hard to undermine public control over our supply chains.in the midst of a pandemic, it would be reckless to put the security of our supply chain at risk. as organizations that represent patients that need plasma drugs to live, we are hopeful that the ucp will uphold the voluntary blood donations act. the lives of the people of alberta are worth it.curtis brandell is the president of the b.c. chapter of the canadian hemophilia society; kat lanteigne is the co-founder of bloodwatch.org. both organizations are official stakeholders in the blood system.