A WOMAN whose haemophiliac husband died after contracting HIV and Hepatitis C from an NHS blood transfusion is echoing recent calls for a ‘Hillsborough-style inquiry’.

Carol Grayson’s husband, Peter Longstaff, who died aged 47 in 2005, was one of thousands of British haemophiliacs, who for years were routinely given contaminated blood products donated by American prisoners.

The 47-year-old is backing calls from former health secretary Andy Burnham for major investigation to be launched.

Mrs Grayson, who is from Hartlepool, and lives in Jesmond, Newcastle, said: “Batch numbers of treatment received by my husband Peter who had both viruses was traced back via US lawyers to Arkansas State Penitentiary where prisoners sold their blood, which was used by the NHS.

“Blood was imported from the US putting profit before safety and sourced from high-risk donors prisoners, skid-row donors in a way that violated virtually every safety rule in the book.

“The Government has never had an inquiry into the worst medical treatment disaster in the history of the NHS.”

In 1986, The Northern Echo launched its Fight for Justice campaign, which showed how the Government had failed to act quickly enough to prevent contaminated blood clotting agents from being supplied to haemophiliacs.

It led to millions of pounds compensation being paid out to victims, but critics say this is not enough.

Mrs Grayson, who set up Haemophilia Action UK in 1994, campaigned to get justice for victims of contaminated blood with her husband, who was also from Hartlepool, before he died from the effects of Hepatitis C on April 16, 2005.

To date, more than 2,000 deaths have been linked to the use of NHS contaminated blood products in the 1970s and 1980s.

Ms Grayson said: “Haemophiliacs have never been compensated receiving only “ex-gratia” payments which are wholly inadequate.

“Many widows are now suffering ill-health too after years of caring for their loved ones and are unable to work.”

Before the dissolution of Parliament, Andy Burnham, who has just been elected Mayor of Great Manchester described the scandal as a "criminal cover-up on an industrial scale".

Speaking in the House of Commons, the former Labour MP for Leigh said victims were "guinea pigs".

Mr Burnham gave examples of inappropriate treatment given to patients, tests being done on people without their knowledge or consent, and results from such tests being withheld for several years.

He compared the campaigns by relatives of infected people to those of families of the Liverpool football fans crushed to death in the Hillsborough stadium disaster in 1989 and said both cases "resulted in appalling negligence from public bodies" and involved "an orchestrated campaign to prevent the truth from being told".

Mr Burnham vowed to take his claims to the police if a new inquiry is not established before Parliament breaks for its summer recess in July.

Health minister Nicola Blackwood resisted calls for a fresh inquiry, arguing thousands of documents had been released by the Department of Health in relation to the scandal, and two reviews had already been carried out.