A MOTHER whose son died after contracting HIV from an infected blood transfusion in the 1970s has said compensation would allow his legacy to live on.

Graham Polumbo died three decades ago at the age of 15 after treatment for his haemophilia at the Churchill Hospital went drastically wrong, leading him to contract HIV from contaminated blood.

His mother Janette Johnson said: "He was such a lovely, happy little boy who was always smiling and I'll never be able to express how heartbreaking what happened was.

"Graham never got to see his sister grow up or meet his niece and nephew and, if not for me, I want some kind of compensation from the Government so they can buy a house in his legacy and move on with their lives.

"I also want a proper apology from David Cameron because one small apology in Parliament in 2015 is not going to bring back the thousands of people who were taken away from their parents."

More than 6,000 people were infected by HIV and Hepatitis C from contaminated blood during the 1970s and 1980s and more than 2,000 have died since but legally their families are not protected or covered by the Government.

Mrs Johnson said she never expected her son to be "torn away" from her by the National Health Service, which she believed was keeping her son alive.

The 68-year-old, from Woodstock, said: "I discovered Graham was a haemophiliac not long after he was born and it was quite stressful at first, because any bump or fall may have meant that he would begin to bleed internally.

"I eventually needed to take him for a blood transfusion at the Churchill Hospital but I never could've anticipated that he would have been given contaminated blood from goodness knows where.

"Inquiries have shown the blood came from prostitutes and drug addicts and it tears me apart to think that the Government allowed dirty, contaminated blood to be put into my son, which eventually killed him."

Ms Johnson, a grandmother-of-two, said her and Graham were asked to visit the hospital when he turned 15, and doctors warned the pair he may have contracted HIV or Hepatitis C from the blood transfusions.

She said: "As soon as they said it, I just knew that he had it and when test results confirmed it, they never gave me any indication of the consequences.

"It never occurred to me that my son might die, I just thought he was really poorly and didn't understand the extent of the tragic mistake."

Graham returned to The Malborough Church of England School in Woodstock after his diagnosis and Ms Johnson said he was bullied "mercilessly" for having HIV.

She said: "The children at his school were so horrible to him when he went back and it still breaks my heart to think that that's what his last days at school were like.

"The teachers explained it to the pupils but there was such a stigma around it at the time that they just didn't understand."

Soon after returning to school, Graham developed septicaemia and died in the Churchill Hospital, only four days before his sister's 12th birthday.

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