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THE BLOOD SUPPLY IN THE UNITED States and other developed countries has never been as safe as it is now. During the past several decades, there have been dramatic progressive reductions in the risk of transfusion-transmitted clinically significant blood-borne infections. This has been accomplished as a result of extensive research to characterize transfusiontransmitted pathogens, development of strategies to measure infection rates in blood donor and recipient populations, characterization of the dynamics of early viremia, and implementation of progressively more restrictive donor eligibility criteria and increasingly sensitive laboratory screening methods.

In addition, regulatory oversight by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has been strengthened, resulting in enhanced quality assurance programs in blood collection and transfusion facilities. Pathogen reduction methods, already successfully …