Indus Vitals

Regulator cites weak oversight, unsafe practices and TTI risks; vows tighter enforcement and improved screening KARACHI: Unregistered or informal blood collection activities pose a significant risk to transfusion safety in Sindh due to the absence of standardised screening, licensing and regulatory oversight, the Sindh Blood Transfusion Authority (SBTA) has said, highlighting continuing challenges in bringing such operators under formal regulation. In response to queries regarding blood safety and transfusion-transmissible infections (TTIs), the authority’s Secretary, Dr Dur-e Naz Jamal, stated that informal collectors increase the likelihood of unsafe transfusions and heightened transmission risks, as they operate outside established quality-control systems. She acknowledged that regulating independent or informal collectors remains complex. Among the key challenges are difficulty in identifying unregistered operators, limited enforcement resources, legal constraints, and public...

SBTA data shows 5.7pc of blood donations in 2025 detected reactive for at least one infection By Mukhtar Alam KARACHI: Thousands of donated blood units in Sindh were discarded in 2025 after screening detected transfusion-transmissible infections (TTIs), highlighting continuing public health challenges and gaps in safe donor recruitment, this emerged lately. Data compiled from four regional blood centres (RBCs) and blood banks registered with the Sindh Blood Transfusion Authority (SBTA) show that 47,375 blood units were rejected after testing positive for infections such as HIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, syphilis and malaria. The figures indicate that 5.7 per cent of the 833,050 blood donations screened during the year were found reactive for at least one infection, meaning roughly one in every 20 donated blood units could not be used for transfusion. According to SBTA records, 209 licensed blood banks across Sindh collectively received 932,966 donors in 2025 -- 920,585 ma...