Thousands of people across Canada donate blood after mad cow-related ban lifted
CTV
Last November, Health Canada granted approval to lift the donation ban for people who had lived or travelled for an extensive period of time in the U.K., Ireland or France in the 1980s and 1990s.
Padma Ranjan used to pass a blood donation centre on her bus ride to work in Vancouver and wish she could donate.
Her family had been regular blood donors when she was growing up in Malaysia. She moved to the U.K. in the late 1970s and came to Canada about 10 years later.
Her desire to give blood intensified in recent years when her husband developed internal bleeding in his upper bowel and required weekly blood transfusions.
"When he first needed the blood I thought 'Oh my God. I could have given,'" said Ranjan, who is 69.
Ranjan's years in the U.K. made her ineligible to donate in Canada because of concerns around the possible transmission of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease — the human form of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or "mad cow disease."
But last November, Health Canada granted approval to lift the donation ban for people who had lived or travelled for an extensive period of time in the U.K., Ireland or France in the 1980s and 1990s.
Canadian Blood Services began allowing that previously ineligible group to start donating on Dec. 4.
