Considering the fact that huge amount of blood collected during blood donation drives across the state gets either expired or drained out, a BMC run hospital has gone to the extent of providing over 1000 litres of blood to other private hospitals on credit/debit basis in the past two years.

Even more startling revelation is that 513 units of blood of the same hospital got expired between 2012 and 2014, which translated into criminal wastage of over 179 litres, according to sources.

In 2013, the hospital gave away 412 units of blood to six private hospitals in Mumbai - Jaslok Hospital, K J Somaiya Blood Bank, Nanavati Hospital, BPT Hospital, Wadia Hospital and Bombay Hospital. In 2014, 613 units of blood was given to 7 hospitals - BSES Hospital, K J Somaiya Blood Bank, Prince Aly Khan Hospital, Wadia Hospital, Bombay Hospital, Breach Candy Hospital and Tata Memorial Hospital.

According to sources, private hospitals getting blood on the credit/debit basis is justified as it is donated free of cost but there is also a possibility that patients in need might be forced to pay over and above the prescribed amount per unit of blood.

BMC run hospitals have been conducting camps to collect blood but the exercise lacks accountability and transparency as there is hardly any monitoring system in place to oversee whether the blood collection is done as per guidelines.

According to sources, norms related to voluntary blood donation are being blatantly flouted like collection of whole blood over and above the prescribed limit of 500 litres and not sharing proper information to and from the donors as stipulated by National AIDS Control Organization (NACO).

These trends were reported during a blood donation drive at a state-run hospital during the period between December 2013 and April 2014 where several camps were conducted in violation of the NACO guidelines.

A state run hospital threw-off 717 units of whole blood due to lack of a proper infrastructure. Moreover, around 80 people have also contracted HIV due to transfusion of infected blood last year due to negligence while conducting and then screening blood. Any person who tests positive for HIV during a donation camp is seldom informed about his status or referred to an Integrated Counselling and Testing Centres (ICTC) centre, although both are mandatory.

HIV in most blood banks is still tested through ELISA test that has an innate shortcoming. If a person has recently contracted HIV, this test may not show it. It can detect HIV antibodies that take a minimum of three months to show in the blood. Most blood banks have not graduated to advanced tests such as Nucleic Acid Amplification Testing (NAT) due to financial constraints. Currently, only a handful of the city's leading private hospitals offer NAT-tested blood, which costs at least Rs. 1,200 per unit. None of the state-run and BMC blood banks, however, has this facility.