HIV in thalassaemic children: Probe body finds no evidence

Media advised to exercise restraint while reporting on HIV/AIDS issues.

ISLAMABAD:

A two-member probe body has found no traces of HIV in thalassaemic children.

The team tasked to probe the issue of 10 thalassaemic children who were suspected to have tested positive for HIV, said in its preliminary report that no samples of any suspected HIV positive thalassaemia cases had been received by the National Referral Laboratory in the recent past.

The team comprising Safe Blood Transfusion Programme National Coordinator Prof Hasan Abbas Zaheer and National AIDS Control Programme (NACP) Manager Dr Baseer Khan Achakzai also said that the Pakistan Thalassaemia Federation has failed to provide a list of the thalassaemia major patients and their lab reports, said an official at the health ministry while sharing the findings.



The official added that by refusing to share the list, the federation has actually ‘distanced itself from the controversy’ by denying any knowledge about these patients.

The news about the detection of the HIV infection through contaminated blood transfusion in 10 thalassaemia major patients in Lahore, Rawalpindi and Islamabad has been circulating in the national media for the last three days. The news has been attributed to Pakistan Thalassaemia Federation General Secretary Prof Yasmeen Rashid.

“No samples of any suspected HIV positive thalassaemia case have been received from Lahore or Rawalpindi/Islamabad for testing in its national referral laboratory,” according to the initial findings of the probe.

The National HIV Testing Policy and WHO recommendations state that HIV infection diagnosis is only established after confirmatory testing through Western blot test — an expensive and sophisticated laboratory investigation — available free-of-cost at the NACP National Referral Laboratory.

The findings also quote the NACP and IBTA as ‘categorically refuting the baseless allegations of detection of HIV infection among 14 thalassaemia patients through contaminated blood transfusion in Lahore’.

“The media is advised to exercise caution and restraint. HIV infection carries a stigma and its patients already suffer from stress and emotional issues due to chronic shortages of blood and lack of access to treatment,” it states further.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 6^th, 2014.