Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 1998. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Associated Press - Tuesday December 8, 1998
A Geneva court ruled that Alfred Haessig, the 77-year-old former director of the Swiss central laboratory of the Red Cross, put people at risk through his actions in the 1980s, and said he had acted out of "pride and stubbornness."
The case was brought after official complaints were made by eight infected Swiss hemophiliacs, four of whom have since died.
District Attorney Bernard Bertossa said that as a scientist Haessig would have been aware starting in 1982 there was a risk blood products could transmit the AIDS virus.
But Haessig continued to supervise the manufacture of the blood products until November 1985 and the distribution of them until the May 1986, Bertossa said. Safer options existed but he failed to use them, the prosecution argued.
Haessig admitted that he had not used pasteurization because he had believed it was less efficient in treating hemophiliacs.
"I did nothing wrong, but certain things could have been done better," Haessig told the court.
Haessig retired in 1987.
Among the victims were brothers Miguel and Francisco Fernandez, who gave a statement before their deaths in 1994 and 1995 that they had never been warned of the danger from the blood products.
"We needed it. We had no choice. You have to have confidence in doctors," they said.
The Red Cross laboratory provided 80 percent of the blood products for hemophiliacs in Switzerland at the time of the contamination. Doctors told the court that they had thought the Red Cross products were particularly good, describing the Swiss mark as "a label of quality."
The laboratory issued a statement after the verdict expressing deep regret about the distribution of tainted products, which it said was "one of the greatest human tragedies of our time."
The Swiss Red Cross also expressed regret over the infections.
The three-judge panel cleared Haessig of a charge of grievous bodily harm.
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