Quack Health-Care Worker Infects Four Children With HIV/AIDS

HERE are palpable fears among the  people of Bejin in Bosso Local Government Area of Niger State, following their bitter taste of medical quackery, as four of their children were transfused with HIV/AIDs infected blood by a community health worker, who operated an illegal hospital in the area.

Saturday Tribune investigation further gathered that the fears of the people stemmed from the fact that the said  health worker (names withheld) had allegedly been operating in the community unchallenged by the officials of the state’s Ministry of health for  almost two years,  after which the lid was blown off his criminal activities two weeks ago, when he allegedly  transfused the four children who had malaria with the infected blood.

It was further  learnt that he had admitted the children as patients, but the situation of the children allegedly deteriorated, which made the parents to seek medical help in  another hospital where it was allegedly discovered that the blood administered on  the children had  been  infected with HIV.

Further checks, however, revealed that the officials of the Niger State Ministry of Health, who were said to have been tipped off  through the state’s  Agency for the Control of HIV/AIDS swung into action and invited the police to arrest the health worker.

It  could, however, not be ascertained where the infected blood was sourced by the suspect before  it was transfused into the  affected children, just as  it was gathered that the blood might have been donated by one of the villagers without  being screened with the usual  procedural test as is the case in public or private hospitals.

Confirming the incident in an interview with the Saturday  Tribune on Thursday in Minna, the state capital,  was the state’s Commissioner of Health and Hospital Services, Mallam Yahaya Dansallawu,  who said, “we have set  up a committee which visited Bejin on Thursday  and we are awaiting the  report but we tested one of the four children we were told was involved and unfortunately the one we tested was actually HIV positive.”

The commissioner stated that the incident just got to the notice of the ministry about two weeks ago and the hospital has been closed down and the man handed over to the police. He added that the ministry would come out with the full report after the committee set up had submitted its report.

NigeriaTribune