4 Patients get HIV from organ donor

November 14, 2007

A troubling case in which a high-risk organ donor infected four patients with the AIDS virus and hepatitis has led medical ethicists to warn that patients need to know more about whose organs they’re getting. Public health officials said Tuesday the Chicago case is the first known instance of HIV transmission through organ transplants since 1986.

It’s also the first ever known instance in which one organ donor has spread hepatitis C and HIV at the same time, said Dr. Matt Kuehnert of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (Wired News)