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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 6 Hansard (18 June) . . Page.. 2088 ..

MR SMYTH

It is hoped that the answer to this problem is in the blood harvested from the umbilical cord. For reasons that medical experts still do not fully understand, patients transfused with cord blood that is not completely matched-that is, the cord blood has only been matched on four or five of the six unique tissue types-do not seem to suffer so much from life-threatening complications like GVHD. The implications of that are obvious.

The chance of finding a suitable donor from a bank of 5,000 cord blood units is over 80 per cent. Using the old, bone marrow technique, if you are unrelated the chance is 0.1 per cent; with the new technique it is over 80 per cent.

The majority of cord blood transplants performed worldwide have to date been undertaken with cord blood collected and stored in the New York cord blood bank. This bank has well in excess of 6,000 donations and has been able to supply cord blood to more than 400 patients. Around 90 millilitres-less than half a cup-is collected from the umbilical cord. This is 10 times less than what is usually used for a bone marrow transplant.

In the year 2000-01 the federal budget had $9 million of funding over four years to establish a national cord blood bank. That funding provides for the collection of 22,000 tested and stored units in Australia, which include 2,000 units of cord blood type from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Ethnicity is an important issue in collecting cord blood, as tissue types vary between different ethnic groups. Australia needed its own cord blood bank, as genetic differences even showed up between cord blood from people born in New York and cord blood from people born in Australia.

Australia has purchased cord blood units from the international registers, but it was recognised that a national bank that reflected Australia's genetic make-up would ensure a greater degree of compatibility. The first cord bank established in Australia was at the Sydney Childrens Hospital in 1995. Since then, banks have been established in Melbourne and Brisbane, and Sydney now has four collection sites. Tasmania, South Australia and Western Australia are expected to come on line in the next two years. We also have indigenous collection centres in Darwin and Alice Springs, which have populations much smaller than Canberra's.

Information my office has obtained to date does not suggest that the ACT is about to become a collection centre. Hence, the call today is not for the government to establish but to investigate the possibility of establishing such a centre in the national capital. My office spoke to Dr Marcus Vowels, Director of the Australian Cord Blood Bank and an associate professor of paediatrics, who kindly provided me with information for the debate today.

More than 2,000 cord blood transplants have taken place in the world, the figure increasing exponentially since 1993. The experts are now saying that the success rate is comparable to compatible bone marrow transplant. The advantage is that the ability to find a matching donor is much enhanced. In Australia around 50 children have been treated with cord blood in the last seven to eight years. Like the figures worldwide, the rate is increasing. Another benefit of the cord blood is the fact that it can be stored for 15 to 20 years, and it is hoped that further research will reveal that cord blood can be stored for many years beyond that.

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