Thousands of Brits are feared to be infected with hepatitis C – a ‘silent killer’ which usually displays no symptoms until a patient becomes more seriously ill.

It comes as at least 30,000 people were infected with unscreened blood carrying either HIV or hepatitis between 1970 and 1991. Around 2,000 Brits who received the tainted blood during transfusions may have no idea they have the disease, which could lead to cancer.

The infected blood scandal has since been recognised as the biggest treatment disaster in NHS history, with 3,000 of those infected already dead. Two main groups of people had fallen victim to the scandal, including those with haemophilia, and patients with similar disorders, who have a rare genetic condition which prevents their blood from clotting properly.

Hepatitis C is often labelled a ‘silent killer’ because it has few initial symptoms which are often hard to detect. But with every year a person carries the virus, there is an increased risk of dying from liver cirrhosis and related cancers. Roughly 12,800 people in England have requested NHS home-testing kits in the space of a week compared to 2,300 in the entire month of April, as news of the scandal has re-emerged as the infected blood inquiry is due to release its final report today following a six-year probe.

At the time of the scandal, the UK was struggling to meet demands for blood-clotting treatments and imported supplies from the US, which included donations from drug users and prison inmates. But blood screenings only began being in 1991 when the first virus was found in a laboratory just 18 months prior.