In My View

In his previous position, Jan M Bult has given his personal view on many issues relevant for the plasma protein therapeutics industry. This segment will be a continuation of that series.

Mexican border issue

About 15 years ago that the owner of one of the manufacturers of plasma derived medicinal products wrote me a letter and asked me to personally close the plasma collection centers along the Mexican border in the USA. Mexican citizens who were in the possession of an US issued Visa, were able to cross the border and donate their plasma and received a compensation for it. The reasons for the lett...

Ukraine

For a little over 2 years, I am advising Biopharma Plasma, a company in Ukraine. The company has built a state if the art fractionation plant in Bila Tserkva, approximately 70 kilometers away from the capital Kyiv. In addition, the company has built a network of plasma collection centers and is demonstrating that it is possible to build a successful company if you have commitment and resources,...

Otto Schwarz Award

It is a while ago that I wrote a column and it time to start again. Last week I received the prestigious Otto Schwarz Award from the Plasma Protein Therapeutics Association (PPTA). This Award is given to individuals that have shown leadership in the plasma protein industry. Many times I was able to present this award to winners and now I was the recipient. It is a strange but pleasant feelin...

Human milk regulation

This time I want to focus on a side of our society where there is a lot of suffering by innocent people that is not commonly known. I am talking about babies who are born premature. A normal pregnancy lasts about 40 weeks from the date of the last menstruation cycle. Every year in Europe there are about 500,000 children born before week 37 and 100,000 will have to go to Intensive Care. Of th...

Experiences with a KLM reservation

Recently I had made a reservation to fly from Amsterdam to Kyiv, Ukraine. When I learned that Ukraine has closed its borders for foreigners as part of their COVID-19 containment measures, I had to cancel my flight. I went to the website, forgot and entered 3 times a wrong password. Now the system kicked me out and I had to get a new password. All my fault and I cannot complain about that. ...

The COVID-19 testing saga in the United States

Since I spend most of my time in the USA, I am “privileged” to all news in this country. There is good news and bad news. Unfortunately, there is also a lot of nonsense and misleading (even false) information. I am going to try to break it down in pieces. When I am writing this, according to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus dashboard (which I recommend to everyone who wants to know mor...

Cees Smit

It must have been about 25 years ago that I met Cees Smit for the first time. I had just started in 1995 as the Executive Director of the European Association of the Plasma Products Industry. A long name with a history that I will explain at another moment. Cees Smit is a special individual who taught me one the first and important lessons around hemophilia. He taught me to talk about persons ...

COVID 19 in the USA

IT IS WORSE THAN YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE Less than 6 months ago, the world heard for the first time about the SARS-CoV-2 virus, better known as COVID-19. Today as I am writing this, the official count from the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center is that worldwide over 10 million persons are/were infected, and half a million people have died from it. A total of 188 countries is hit by the vi...

Oh Boy, How I was wrong

A few weeks ago, I posted a column about the new COVID-19 virus and in that column, I made a comparison about the number of people affected by the flu. I should not have done that. It was a true mischaracterization of a serious infection that should not be downplayed at all. After reading an excellent article called Coronavirus: The Hammer and the Dance, I changed my mind and realized that w...

Do we have to worry about the new coronavirus?

Do we have to worry about the new coronavirus? We all have seen the news after the Wuhan coronavirus was discovered and started to spread around the world. It will not take long before we will see very interesting scientific and epidemiological articles about this virus. For me it is another manifestation of a global world. National or territorial thinking will not contain or control them. ...

Inventory Management

Inventory Management Is building inventory a good strategy or just selfish? Around the year 2000, the world was still experiencing a shortage of immunoglobulin therapies that caused all kind of concerns for the patients in need of this therapy. Then the production of recombinant FVIII was reduces, causing a worldwide shortage of rFVIII. Patients needed to be switched to plasma derived therapi...

Latin America needs more plasma

Latin America needs more plasma The Latin American Society for Immune Deficiency (LASID) held its bi-annual meeting in Cancun in October 2019. It was a very impressive meeting that started in its opening session with a short video of patient testimonials. I was not aware that in Mexico, children with primary immune deficiency only receive treatment with immune globulins until they are 5 yea...

Edwin J Cohn

Donor incentives Recently I was in a meeting with executives from US Blood Banks to talk about ways to incentivize donors. In the plasma industry the incentives are monetary, in Blood Banks it is mostly in the from of gifts like mugs, T-shirts, pins and other gifts. The reason for the meeting was that there is increasing discussion in the blood community whether the blood banks can sustain wi...

Donor incentives

Edwin J Cohn A brilliant chemist dressed in a three- piece suit who saved the lives of many persons. A person who, in my view, should have been awarded a Nobel Prize. Cohn became famous for his work on the fractionation of plasma during World War II. He developed the techniques for isolating the human serum albumin fraction out of plasma. Albumin is essential for maintaining osmotic press...

Stkhldr mtg

Stkhldr mtg On October 28, 2019 the European Commission organized a stakeholders meeting to discuss issues related to the potential revision of the European Blood Directive. One of the key messages was that Europe needs to do more when it comes to plasma collection. In that context it is interesting to see what some of the arguments were from representatives from the public sector. The pri...

Memories of Shinji Wada

Memories of Shinji Wada Last week I read the terrible news about many lives being taken after the horrible tornado Hagibis in Japan. That was the moment that I started to think about a very good friend, Shinji Wada who unfortunately passed away almost a year ago. I turned on my tablet and listened to Shinji singing a Beatles song (Twist and Shout) at one of the company gatherings. I had bitt...

Forgiveness is a virtue

Forgiveness is a virtue This week we have seen an extraordinary example of forgiveness. Dallas police officer Amber Guyger was convicted of murder of Botham Jean and sentenced to 10 years in prison. His 18 years old brother Brandt gave one of the most impressive victim statements I have ever seen. He stated: “I forgive you. I don’t even want you to go to jail. I want the best for you. Because ...

Differentiation is more than a word

Differentiation is more than a word On a regular basis we see and hear comments about cost saving measures for pharmaceuticals. Too often is the plasma protein sector immediately drawn into this debate because many persons do not understand why this sector is so different from what we call traditional pharmaceuticals. Plasma protein therapies (PPT’s) are used by persons with rare diseases. ...

Born this way

Born this way On one of my flights I was listening to music and heard a song from Lady Gaga with the title “Born This Way”. I liked the music, the energy and started to think about the title. A child does not ask where she or he is born and will grow up in the country where the first breath will fill the lungs. From that moment on this child is on its journey to adulthood and (in its innoce...

Spend the tax-payer money wisely

Spend the tax-payer money wisely From the roof of my hotel in Barcelona, I see the calm Mediterranean Sea on one side and the Sagrada Familia on the other side. Looking at this incredibly beautiful architecture, you see one of the spectacular buildings that Antoni Gaudi has left as his legacy in this beautiful city. Two years ago, there were about half a...

Societal responsibilities

Societal responsibilities Every society has a responsibility to treat patients with a genetic disorder. Several years ago, I wrote about an article about injustice. Because of recent developments, I want to bring this to your attention again. I believe there is something fundamentally wrong in our society when outrageous sums of money are spent dealing with the negative effects of tobacco use i...