Part One: How Tainted Human Blood Became A Major U.S. Export
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What controversial topic is discussed regarding blood plasma?
Oh my God, welcome back to Behind the Bastards, a podcast where me and my guest for this week, the great Ben Bolin, are about to get targeted and murdered by the Clinton crime family. Ben, how are you doing today? Finally, you know what I mean?
Finally, yes. We've been living the dream, dying the dream. Yes, here we go. Yeah, it's great to it's great to be back. It's great to hang out with you. I was thinking of you and the team recently because I don't know whether you recall, Robert, but know these many years ago when you were just beginning a podcast called Behind the Bastards. You graced us with with an appearance, a cameo, dropped a hot 16 on a show we do called Ridiculous. Yes. Do you remember that?
I do remember that. Yes. About the governor of or the founder, one of the founders of Oregon, if I'm not mistaken.
You're right. Yes. Oregon originated as a supremacist.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, today we're not talking about that, although we are talking about something where racism is involved. We're talking about I wasn't entirely joking about the Clintons. They are they are intricately involved in this story, or at least Bill is. But Ben, what do you know about the blood industry?
Do you mean like- Ben Bolin, host of Stuff They Don't Want You to Know and Ridiculous History and a bunch of other stuff. All right, all right. You mentioned one of them, yes. Like as a fan or just the industry overall?
So you are a fan of Blood. You're a big Blood guy?
Yeah, that's what people say about me. Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, who doesn't? I enjoy having roughly five liters of blood in my body.
That's what everybody says about you, man.
Every time I'm in or adjacent to a shooting, I think, boy, it's great having all of my blood still inside of me.
Yeah.
I also love, you know, like any other damn peer, I am a huge supporter of blood donations. You know what I mean?
Huge supporter. Yes. Yeah. And that's what we're kind of talking about today because there's some problem. Donating blood. There's this great story that's going around because the fellow just died of this lovely elderly Australian man who found out that he had a rare blood factor that was crucial in making a medicine that millions of babies needed to live. So he just donated blood for like decades.
Yeah.
Why is blood a major export for the U.S.?
Saving like two and a half million babies. That's great. Donating blood. Great. Blood as a commodity is what we're talking about here. And there's some deeply problematic aspects of it. And I wanted to start by saying, where do you think blood lies on the list of US exports by value?
Ooh, by value, not by liquid weight. Okay.
No, no, blood and blood products. How much of a chunk of the U.S. economy do you think that would be?
Clever, clever question, Robert, because that would factor in things like plasma. Right, yes, of course. Okay, so with that, I would... Gosh, it's a difficult question. It's a difficult question. I don't know the answer.
It is the ninth largest export for the entire United States. Holy shit. Yes. It beats like coal. Blood is a massive industry in the United States. It is like, again, it's one of our largest exports. Blood products make up 1.8% of all U.S. exports, which is up about half a percent from where it was 10 years ago. And blood exports are valued at about $37 billion today. It's much larger. I did not realize when I started how big a... That's a significant piece of the economy.
That's top 10. Yes. That's top 10.
Yes, yes. Oh, man. And here's the thing. That's shocking when you just like, I never would have thought of... If I had been asked to guess the 10 largest exports, blood wouldn't have been on my list. But here's the thing. Hmm. The United States provides 70% of the blood plasma used worldwide to make medicine. The plasma? Yes, yes. 70% of all blood plasma used on the planet in medicine comes from here. We are the largest exporter of blood products on the planet, and no one else comes very close.
Go USA. To an extent, yes.
And this is one of those things where we're talking about how messed up a lot of this industry is. It's not like some messed up industries where it's like, well, maybe we don't all need this product that the U.S. puts out. Or maybe there's alternatives to this product that has harmful consequences. We do really need a lot of blood and blood products. It's very important for medicine.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What controversial topic is discussed regarding blood plasma?
0:02–2:34
2
Why is blood a major export for the U.S.?
2:34–7:30
3
How does the blood donation system exploit vulnerable populations?
7:30
4
What are the dangers of using prison-derived plasma?
4:48–9:21
5
What historical events influenced the blood industry?
9:21–9:25
6
How does capitalism affect blood donation practices?
9:25–9:46
7
What role does regulation play in the blood plasma industry?
9:46–9:56
8
How did the AIDS crisis impact blood donation policies?
9:56–1:21:14