Virological safety of the UK blood supply in the era of individual risk assessments and PrEP
- Programme
- HSST
- Specialty
- Virology
- Project published
- 31/12/2026
A more individualised donor selection policy was implemented in the UK on 14th June 2021, which replaced the previous 3-month deferral for MSM. Other blood services have a variety of policies in place to ensure the virological safety of blood components, ranging from an indefinite ban on MSM, to a defined period of exclusion, to individualised risk assessment not based on gender. These policies are based on scientific evidence, epidemiology within donor populations and virological window periods. Developments in NAT technology and assays which can detect both antibodies and antigens in the very early stages of infection have significantly reduced the risk in most developed countries. However, the resulting early detection and therefore early treatment of HIV, and the potential usage of PrEP within the UK blood donor population has brought with it new diagnostic challenges within blood screening, mainly non-detection of HIV RNA and serological markers. The potential use of other testing strategies such as detection of HIV DNA and screening for non-declared PreP usage should be investigated further.
Please note, this abstract has been published word for word in a journal publication listed below.
Maddox V, Vallely P, Brailsford SR, Harvala H. Virological safety of the UK blood supply in the era of individual risk assessments and HIV PrEP. Transfus Med. 2023 Oct;33(5):372-378. doi: 10.1111/tme.12993. Epub 2023 Sep 5. PMID: 37668150.
Outputs
Maddox V, Vallely P, Brailsford SR, Harvala H. Virological safety of the UK blood supply in the era of individual risk assessments and HIV PrEP. Transfus Med. 2023 Oct;33(5):372-378. doi: 10.1111/tme.12993. Epub 2023 Sep 5. PMID: 37668150.
Maddox V, Reynolds C, Amara A, Else L, Brailsford SR, Khoo S, Harvala H. Undeclared pre-exposure or post-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP/PEP) use among syphilis-positive blood donors, England, 2020 to 2021. Euro Surveill. 2023 Mar;28(11):2300135. doi: 10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2023.28.11.2300135. PMID: 36927721; PMCID: PMC10021473.
Harvala H, Reynolds C, Ijaz S, Maddox V, Penchala SD, Amara A, Else L, Brailsford S, Khoo S. Evidence of HIV pre-exposure or post-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP/PEP) among blood donors: a pilot study, England June 2018 to July 2019. Sex Transm Infect. 2022 Mar;98(2):132-135. doi: 10.1136/sextrans-2021-054981. Epub 2021 Mar 29. PMID: 33782147; PMCID: PMC8862030.