Despite being warned as long ago as 1968 by leading medical experts about the problems of so-called 'economy-class syndrome', the airlines played down the dangers and gave no advice to passengers on how to minimize the risks. Hundreds of people are feared to have died as a result.

As recently as 1998, airlines and aviation authorities dismissed disclosures in The Observer about the potential danger of cramped seating causing clots, saying there was no evidence.

Yet in a letter published 16 years ago in the Lancet medical journal, experts warned that 'airline passengers, even those on very long flights, are given no specific advice to prevent venous thrombosis'.

Three doctors working at a hospital near Heathrow - Yvonne Hart, D. J. Holdstock and William Lynn - wrote: 'Working in a hospital on the perimeter of London Airport we see a steady stream of illnesses which have developed in flight. The major manifestation of the illness may not occur until after disembarkation. We have seen several patients with thromboembolism presenting in this way, with a near-fatal outcome in one case.'

Dr Dale Egerton, a Hampshire GP who saved his wife's life in 1998 after she suffered a massive blood clot, said last night: 'It beggars belief that the medical team at British Airways did not read that letter to the Lancet. It sets out the problem that the syndrome can develop after disembarkation and calls for research. If it is known that people are suffering DVT [deep vein thrombosis] after they leave the airport, then the airline companies have a moral responsibility to do the research. But nothing was done - an utter disgrace.'

Our investigation has uncovered a culture of deceit at some airlines which has been allowed to thrive due to complacency at the Department of Health and the Civil Aviation Authority.

Today we reveal that:

• airline company doctors have known about the risks of immobility since 1940 and the risks of immobility on long-haul flights since 1968

• British Airways highlights a misleading study on its website which downplays the risks of long flights

• a new study to be published in the Lancet will show compelling evidence of a link between long-haul flights and DVT

• British Airways has not allowed doctors access to its passengers to do more research

• no data on the number of cases of DVT caused by long flights is collected nationally or at major casualty hospital units

• the Civil Aviation Authority has no responsibility to look after passengers

• water, vital to prevent dehydration in long flights, was found, in tests by Britain's Public Health Laboratories, to be contaminated with E.coli and human excrement in 15 per cent of the fountains surveyed on jets using major British airports.

Only now are major air lines alerting customers to DVT on tickets. British Airways now tells passengers to flex their ankles while seated.

The first study warning of the dangers of immobility was published in 1940, and follow-up reports looking at blood-clot risks to passengers in air flights first appeared in 1968.

Dr John Scurr, of University College Hospital, London, is soon to publish fresh research in the Lancet which will show a conclusive link between long-haul flights and DVT.

Dr John Belstead, of Ashford Hospital, near Heathrow, estimates that 15 Britons die a year from DVT developed on long-haul flights.

Egerton, the Hampshire GP, said that if the airlines and the authorities had acted on the warning in the Lancet in 1985, the lives of 225 people could have been saved.

Scurr suspects that the number of deaths could be very much higher. 'Maybe hundreds of Britons are dying every year,' he said.

A spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority pointed out that it had no responsibility for air passengers.

A spokesman for the Department of Health said that DVT was 'very much a now issue' but admitted that it had not been a high priority in the past.

British Airways has in the past downplayed the prevalence of mortalities from DVT, saying that only two people in the world die each year from blood clots caused on long-haul flights.

Last week BA pointed to its website, showing 'facts and research' on DVT. One study shows that DVT is more likely to be caused in cars rather than planes.

Egerton said: 'What British Airways doesn't say is that this study was done in a part of France where there is no international airport. It is a grotesquely misleading way to deal with a major scandal in the public health.'

SOURCE: John Sweeney

DATE: Sunday, January 14, 2001

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