Viral safety remains a major concern in transfusion of blood products. Over years, the control measures applied to blood products were made more and more sophisticated; however, the number of infectious agents, and notably of viruses, that can be transmitted by transfusion is increasing continuously.
The aim of this review paper is to actualize that published in the same journal by the same authors in 2011 with more details on some of actual vs virtual viral threats that were identified recently in the field of blood transfusion.
The main subjects that are covered successively concern the transmission via transfusion of hepatitis E virus, the frequency of transfusion transmitted arboviruses, transfusion at the time of the Ebola epidemics in West Africa, the debated role of Marseillevirus (giant viruses infecting amoebae and suspected to infect human blood latently), and, finally, the recent report of the identification in blood donors of a new member of the Flaviviridae family. The addition of these new viral risks to those already identified-partially controlled or not-pleads for the urgent need to move forward to considering inactivation of infectious agents in blood products.
Transfus Clin Biol. 2016 Jan 15. pii: S1246-7820(15)00431-0. doi: 10.1016/j.tracli.2015.12.004. [Epub ahead of print]