Kolkata,: Three-year-old gets HIV from blood transfusion

June 8, 2004

Three-year-old gets HIV from blood transfusion

8-June-2004

Kolkata, India : A three-year-old boy with thalassaemia has

contracted HIV because he was allegedly given infected blood during

transfusion by a state-run hospital in West Bengal.

The NRS Hospital authorities, which have not identified the boy,

admitted that he has the AIDS-causing virus but said the victim could

have procured blood from somewhere else.

But the boy's parents insist they don't have the means to buy blood

from private blood banks. They say they have been giving their child

blood procured from NRS Hospital.

The boy has thalassaemia, a disease that requires a patient to

undergo repeated blood transfusions to survive.

He has been undergoing periodic blood transfusions at NRS Hospital

since he was diagnosed with thalassaemia when he was just four months

old.

" My son used to feel well after the transfusion until last October.

When we asked the doctors what was wrong with him, they did not tell

us, " the boy's father was quoted as saying by the Telegraph

newspaper.

The doctors also took blood samples from the parents. The parents

last month consulted another doctor who suggested an HIV test for the

child.

The boy was then diagnosed as HIV positive - a damning information

that doctors at NRS Hospital had allegedly withheld from his parents

" The boy continues to be under our treatment. But I don't know how he

got infected with HIV, " West Bengal's director of medical education

C.R. Maity was quoted as saying by the English daily.

NRS Hospital is apparently trying to pass the buck.

I'm not sure if the patient's family had procured blood for

transfusion from our hospital alone. If not, our blood bank is not

responsible. We only carried out the transfusion, " said Purnima

Saumandal, NRS' principal.

The boy's parents, who have been procuring blood for their son from

NRS' blood bank for the past one and a half years, said they started

noticing that their son was becoming weak some time in October last.

" When we told the doctors, they explained it was due to his prolonged

dependence on blood from other people, " the boy's father said.

Indo-Asian News Service

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