[10] The appellant, known only as "CN", was infected with the hepatitis B virus which they believe to have contracted around the time of April 1989 at Hammersmith Hospital, where a blood transfusion was required during the course of a bone marrow transplant.

Since being infected with HBV, CN experienced a number of serious health issues, including: chronic liver disease, renal failure, a compromised immune system, joint degeneration, Hypertension, short-term memory loss, and breathlessness.

In March 1995, CN had initiated litigation in the civil courts with the NHS and the National Blood Authority (NBA) as joint defendants, however the case was eventually discharged following the removal of public funding.

[13] The Master of the Rolls argued that it was possible for the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care to reasonably justify a differential approach to treatment, especially where "economic policy" and decisions concerning disability were involved.

A sliding scale of intensity of review is appropriate in this case, which is concerned with judgments of social and economic policy and with disability, but the Secretary of State must nonetheless be given a wide margin of appreciation in creating an ex gratia scheme of this kind.