Health officials face probe for selling donated blood

Ministry of Health employees are currently being probed on the selling of donated blood outside the country.

Health Cabinet Secretary Mutahi Kagwe said Thursday that the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) is carrying out investigations on how blood donated is sold in and out of the country.

“We have asked the DCI to intervene in the selling of blood outside the borders of this country. There are investigations going on and we expect arrests to be made,” he said.

The Health ministry is in charge of blood donation through the Kenya National Blood Transfusion Services (KNBTS). KNBTS has for the past 15 years relied on the US President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (Pepfar).

Pepfar supported blood collection, testing and policy issues in the country before cutting funding last year, leaving the ministry in a dilemma on how to ensure blood supply is at an optimum..

The funding hitch came at a time the country was facing a chronic shortage of blood, since the collection of blood has been plagued by lack of funds for screening tools and human resources to collect and store blood.

As at August last year, only two of the six national centres — Nairobi and Nakuru — were screening blood.