Four Transplant Recipients Contract H.I.V.
They also contracted Hepatitis C, the first reported cases of simulateous transmission of two viruses through organ donation. The problem seems to have been that the blood was tested, but it was too soon in the infection to find the response to the viruses through the most common form of tests. There is a more expensive and time-consuming test available that can actually measure viral load, giving results days ahead of the others, but it is not normally done. All of the transplants were done in the Chicago area at three different hospitals.
Four cases out of 300,000 since 1994 doesn't sound so bad, but it must be horrible if you're one of the ones brought back from the brink of one illness only to be told you now have two more, both of them deadly and difficult to treat.
Still, I hope this doesn't affect organ donation itself. (It's not like you can get HIV from giving a donation, for one. But look what happened to the blood supply when it was first ) There is a critical need for organs--so much so that sometimes high-risk donors such as this one are allowed to donate. (No one's saying what the high-risk behaviours were--HIPAA, I'm supposing). The article mentions some statistics that illustrate the need: 98,000 people in the United States are on the transplant list, but only about 19,000 transplants have been done this year. Last year, 7,200 died waiting for a transplant that never happened.
I'm an organ donor. I have the back of my driver's licence signed and I've registered at DonateLifeKy.org. I've also made it clear in my living will that I intend to be cremated and they can harvest wherever they want. Now, with my being diabetic I don't know if they'd take my organs. But I'm O+ so I'm almost a universal donor. I'd rather do some good in my death. I'm also on a bone marrow registry. You can learn more about that at Marrow.org. Most of the other states have similar 'Donate Life' websites, too, by the way.
Good night.
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