Italy: Patients given organs from HIV positive donor

Three Italian hospital patients have mistakenly been given organs from an HIV-positive donor.

A 41-year-old woman’s kidneys and liver were taken after she died of a brain haemorrhage at Florence’s Careggi hospital and were implanted due “to a tragic human error,” the hospital said in a statement.

The HIV test on the organs had come back positive, but “unfortunately the expert who did the report wrote down ’negative’ for all the tests, including this one,” said Careggi director Mauro Marabini.

The three patients had been told of the mistake and were being treated with antiretroviral drugs, the statement said. They will undergo tests over the coming months to determine if they have been infected with HIV-- the virus that causes Aids.

“The likelihood of infection is high,” Franco Filipponi, director of the transplants agency for the Tuscany region told Italian news agency ANSA. “Even if the implanted organs do not carry blood, the virus can still be present in some cells and can therefore be transmitted.”

The case has raised serious concerns tonight over transplant procedures in Italy.

Politicians called for the resignation of health officials and doctors involved in the case, and prosecutors in Florence opened an investigation, ANSA reported.

“It’s unthinkable that such serious incidents could occur today, with all the modern equipment available,” said a statement from Italian consumer group Codacons, which demanded inspections in hospital laboratories to check on transplant safety procedures.

Italy’s public health system is not new to scandal. Last month, authorities ordered nationwide inspections after an investigative media report in Rome’s largest hospital showed images of corridors soiled with dog faeces and rubbish, unguarded radioactive material, abandoned medical records and workers smoking next to patients.

Police found that about 17% of hospitals, mostly in southern and central Italy, had problems serious enough to recommend possible judicial investigations against 111 people.