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For-profit company approved to extract plasma at double the rate of Canadian Blood Services
Posted: January 7, 2026
(January 6, 2026) By: Gabe Oatley, TorontoToday.ca
Health Canada cleared Grifols, which operates two paid collection clinics in Toronto, to extract plasma from its clients up to 104 times per year
Advocates are worried Health Canada’s decision to allow a for-profit multinational company to extract blood plasma at twice the annual rate of Canadian Blood Services is putting Canadians at risk.
Grifols, a Spanish pharmaceutical firm, opened two paid collection clinics in Toronto last summer — one in North York and the other in Etobicoke — which offer up to $100 per visit to clients who donate their blood plasma.
As previously reported by TorontoToday, the company is using a “gamified” payment structure and a flurry of social media ads to encourage individuals to sell their plasma as often as twice per week.
Despite the purchase of plasma being illegal in Ontario, Grifols’ business model has been made possible by Canadian Blood Services, the charity tasked with managing the blood supply in all provinces and territories except Quebec.
Facing a shortage of blood plasma donations spurred by the pandemic, Canadian Blood Services — which has an exemption to the paid plasma ban — entered into an agreement with Grifols in 2022, allowing the company to serve as its “agent” in Canada and face no barrier to paying individuals for their plasma.
But while Canadian Blood Services is permitted by Health Canada to extract plasma from any individual a maximum of 52 times per year, the federal health department agreed in 2019 to double that rate for Grifols — permitting the company to conduct up to 104 plasma draws per person annually.
This means Grifols’ clients can be paid to sell their plasma multiple times each week, a rate that would not be allowed at Canadian Blood Services’ donation facilities.
A recent meta study found that twice-weekly plasma collection can cause negative health impacts for donors, including impacting an individual’s levels of immunoglobulin, an infection-fighting antibody, and potentially leading to iron deficiency.
The full agreement between Canadian Blood Services and Grifols has never been publicly released. However, in January, Health Canada shared new details with TorontoToday about the company’s operating guidelines, including its maximum permitted plasma draw frequencies.
Two health-care advocates say the revelations raise urgent questions about whether the Canadian government is doing enough to protect the health of Canadians selling their plasma under this new regulatory landscape.
Grifols can extract plasma 104 times per year, per patient
While many other countries have national limits on the frequency with which an individual can donate or sell their blood plasma, no such regulation exists in Canada.
Here, organizations and companies seeking to collect plasma must apply to Health Canada proposing their own maximum rate.
In an interview with TorontoToday, Natalie Mehra, executive director of advocacy group Ontario Health Coalition, said she was shocked that Health Canada’ authorized Grifols to accept 104 plasma donations per year.
“It’s staggering,” she said. “The fact that the system is weighed in favour of the for-profit multinational drug company is appalling.”
Mehra said she believes Health Canada’s decision could risk the health of people who make the financial decision to routinely visit a Grifols’ clinic.
When TorontoToday spoke to clients outside of Grifols’ North York clinic last month, all of them said they were there to sell plasma because they needed money.
One man from Scarborough said he was “f—ing broke.”
“I came out because I’m on [Ontario Works] and I get f— all for money,” he said. “I can’t even afford to eat, so that’s why I’ve come here to give my blood.”
Among the potential health impacts of making frequent plasma donations, low immunoglobulin can cause severe infections, including bronchitis, meningitis or pneumonia, as well as increase the risk of developing autoimmune diseases, according to the Cleveland Clinic.
Iron deficiency, meanwhile, can result in extreme tiredness, cold hands and feet, or weakness, owing to an absence of sufficient healthy red blood cells, according to the Mayo Clinic.
In a statement to TorontoToday, Grifols said providing safe and pleasant experiences for individuals who sell their plasma is the company’s top priority.
“Across Canada and around the world, people donate plasma regularly with multiple countries allowing donations of up to twice a week,” the company claimed. “At each donation, presenting donors undergo a health assessment to ensure eligibility to donate.”
While the United States permits companies to extract an individual’s plasma up to 104 times per year, many other countries, including France, the Czech Republic, Italy and the Netherlands, restrict donations to about 26 times per year — or once every two weeks.
The 2024 meta study on plasma donations called into question the health and safety claims made by plasma collection companies and industry groups.
“Claims that donating plasma twice a week, as allowed by the [U.S.] Food and Drug Administration, is proven to be safe have often been based on insufficient evidence, mostly involving methodologically flawed observational studies that do not, in fact, support such conclusions,” it said.
Who’s responsible for ensuring patients’ safety?
In response to questions about the safety of high-frequency donations, Grifols stressed it follows all of Health Canada’s regulations and standards.
However, in its emailed statement to TorontoToday, Health Canada said its mandate is to ensure the blood and plasma that is collected in Canada is safe, while donor safety protocols fall under the purview of provincial governments.
“The decision about the acceptable number of times individuals can donate plasma is a donor health and wellness issue and is generally not one that impacts the safety of the plasma collected,” said a federal spokesperson.
“Generally speaking, donor safety considerations would be a practice of medicine matter that falls under the jurisdiction of the provinces and territories.”
Mehra called this justification a “pretty thin attempt to evade responsibility” on Health Canada’s part.
“You can’t both have the power to authorize [blood donation rules] and then say you’re not responsible,” she said.
Ontario’s Ministry of Health did not respond to questions about the safety of high-frequency plasma donations.
Can you be an ‘agent’ if your authorization is different?
Steven Staples, national policy director with advocacy organization Canadian Health Coalition, said Health Canada’s decision to permit Grifols to collect plasma at a higher rate than Canadian Blood Services also raises questions about whether the company is truly acting as an “agent” of the national charity in Ontario.
“It doesn’t sound like Grifols is operating on the same basis as Canadian Blood Services,” he said. “I think there’s a good case to be made that the loophole that Grifols is benefiting from to operate in Ontario to get around the ban is weak at best — and maybe completely false.”
While Ontario has accepted Canadian Blood Services’ claim that Grifols is its domestic agent, British Columbia has not.
In 2023, a B.C. government spokesperson told the Globe and Mail its law against paid plasma collection was not meant to allow a for-profit provider to work on Canadian Blood Services’ behalf. No Grifols clinics have subsequently been established in the western province.
Grifols confirmed in an emailed statement that it operates under a different agreement with Health Canada than Canadian Blood Services.
“Each plasma collection organization is licensed by Health Canada based on the procedures the organization follows at their facilities. CBS operates under a separate license based on CBS policies and procedures,” the spokesperson said.
TorontoToday inquired with Ontario’s Health Ministry as to its rationale for treating Grifols as Canadian Blood Services’ agent given the two organizations’ are operating under materially different Health Canada authorization agreements, but did not receive a response prior to publication.
Canadian Blood Services also did not respond to a related question prior to publication.
Is Grifols following Health Canada’s rules?
In addition to extracting plasma up to 104 times per year, Grifols is also approved to make collections closer together on a weekly basis than Canadian Blood Services.
While Canadian Blood Services is permitted to collect an individual’s plasma every six days, Health Canada told TorontoToday that in 2019 it authorized Grifols to conduct “two donations in a 7-day period with a minimum of 2 days between donations.”
An emailed statement from Grifols raises questions as to whether the company is pushing this limit even further.
When asked about its donation frequency practices in December, Grifols told TorontoToday individuals are permitted to sell their plasma at the company’s clinics up to two times in a seven-day period, with a minimum of just one day between visits — one day fewer between visits than Health Canada seems to have stipulated.
Asked about the seeming discrepancy, Grifols claimed this practice is in compliance with its Health Canada authorization.
“Donors must have at least one calendar day between donations. This means that if a person donates on Tuesday, they can return and donate again on Thursday. This would allow two days between donations, with one calendar day between visits,” a company spokesperson said.
TorontoToday requested clarification from Health Canada as to how a requisite two days between visits could be interpreted correctly as just one day between visits, but did not receive a response prior to publication.
Staples said he believes the federal health department needs to “rein in” the company’s practices.
Grifols said its approach is approved by Health Canada, which regularly audits the companies’ operating procedures, including donation frequency.
Agreement has increased domestic plasma sufficiency
When it was announced in 2022, Canadian Blood Services said its agreement with Grifols would help shore up the domestic supply of immunoglobulins — a protein essential for making medications some Canadians rely on — which are derived from plasma.
The charity told TorontoToday that plan is coming to fruition.
“From the time of entering into our agreement with Grifols, we have reported an increase in domestic plasma sufficiency for immunoglobulins from approximately 15 per cent to 31 per cent, as of the end of September 2025,” a Canadian Blood Services spokesperson said.
Mehra argued that Canada could have grown its domestic plasma supply without the help of a for-profit player.
Canadian Blood Services could have engaged celebrities, politicians and athletes in a national campaign encouraging Canadians to give plasma, or established plasma drives at workplaces, she said.
“The problem is, by bringing profit into the blood system, you now start to create a requirement to have a robust, extremely strong oversight and enforcement regime,” she said.
“Did anyone foresee that a … for profit company would be advertising to poor people to make a stream of income from selling their [plasma] every few days?” she asked.
“No, of course not, because we’ve never had that.”
