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EDITOR’S NOTE IS WADLBY SAFE? NOT BLOODY LIKELY.

By Ruth Miller Fitzgibbons |

Only on a very few occasions in the fifteen-year history of this magazine has a story come along that is as ominous as “Blood Money” (see page 76), researched and written by D writers Glenna Whitley and Jeff Posey. The result of almost two years of investigative work-including scores of interviews, reams of court documents, and countless hours of research, the story tells a shocking and shameful tale of mismanagement, and the abuse of public trust by the owners of The Blood Center at Wadley.

Blood is a strange commodity. Few of us look forward to the idea of giving blood, but we do so out of a feeling of community responsibility, or a desire to help someone in need. Over Wadley’s thirty-eight-year history, literally hundreds of thousands of Dallas citizens have answered that call. Most have done so, as Whitley and Posey put it, “for those people in the plane crash, or the child bitten by a dog, or a James Kilgore”-a pivotal figure in our story, a man who died last summer from AIDS apparently contracted through a Wadley blood transfusion.

But saving lives is not the raison d’etre for Wadley. Research is. Contrary to popular belief, blood from Wadley is not free. The blood center charges up to $100 a pint, one of the highest prices in the U.S. Some of that money goes to support a cancer research center that is not well respected in medical circles, a computer science laboratory, and the private Granville C. Morton Hospital. It is the Wadley founding family’s most ardent desire, say the authors, to find a cure for cancer. The sale of blood-yours and mine-gives them the means to pursue that end.

But that is not the end of the story. Unfortunately, it is the beginning-the starting point for a sorry track record of slipshod handling of blood, repeated violations of Food and Drug Administration standards (one of which resulted in a hush-hush blood recall), and tragically, failure to properly screen blood for the AIDS virus after laboratory test kits were available for the purpose. Ten lawsuits have been filed against Wadley by AIDS victims or their families.

As with many stories of this ilk, our involvement began with a whistle blower. A former Wadley quality control manager brought us allegations of abuse and enough documentation to convince us that there might be validity to his claims. From that point on, we pursued our own course, requesting documents from the FDA through the Freedom of Information Act, reviewing court records in the pending lawsuits, and interviewing dozens of members of the medical community.

Wadley refused to grant our writers access to its facilities. But ironically, Posey had been given “the tour” two years ago while researching a story on AIDS. The assistant technical director at the time, Barbara Laird-Fryer, was visibly nervous, Posey recalls, perspiring heavily and shaking. A Wadley employee later recalled that massive cleanup efforts preceded Posey’s visit.

Secrecy and even duplicity have been Wadley trademarks for many years. Local health professionals say that periodic efforts to police the community blood supply, say with an oversight board, or more dramatic plans to create a communal blood bank have always been thwarted by Wadley. And the medical establishment has stood idly by. Few doctors have much knowledge of the blood bank’s inner workings. Since Wadley enjoys a virtual blood monopoly in Dallas, the attitude among hospital administrators and blood bank directors seems to be “hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil.” Explains Whitley, “Ultimately, they have to fear legal reprisals too. If the hospitals don’t bear the responsibility of ensuring a safe blood supply to their patients, who does?”

Posey and Whitley have waded through tremendous red tape and medical mishmash to bring D’s readers this important story. Meanwhile, Wadley endures as an institution with a prestigious name, a hidden mission, and little impetus for change.

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