Risks associated with red blood cell transfusions: potential benefits from application of pathogen inactivation

Kleinman, Steve; Stassinopoulos, Adonis

Transfusion-transmitted malaria is rare in the United States with an annual incidence of less than one case. 31 The major mechanism to reduce risk is the use of multiple predonation questions, including travel to a malariaendemic area. Due to poor specificity for detecting malarial infections, large numbers of individuals who are not infected with malaria are deferred, thereby impacting blood availability. 32 Furthermore, errors in eliciting travel history lead to a large number of biologic deviation reports to FDA, which has a negative impact on blood operations and staff productivity. The introduction of a robust PI-RBC method that can inactivate all Plasmodium species in all their intra-and extracellular forms may allow elimination of the nonspecific and complex donor questioning used in the United States and eliminate malarial antibody testing that is used in many countries to shorten the deferral period.