Ranchi: The Jharkhand High Court on Thursday pulled up the state government for not following the standard operating procedure for blood transfusion, which allegedly led to HIV infection in five children in the state.
A division bench comprising Chief Justice Tarlok Singh Chauhan and Justice Rajesh Shankar, while hearing a suo motu PIL, rapped Health Secretary Ajoy Kumar Singh, following reports that five children of Chaibasa district who underwent blood transfusion were found to be HIV positive.
The children were thalassemia patients and had come to the Sadar Hospital in Chaibasa for treatment which included transfusion of blood.
The children were transfused blood on different dates in August and September this year.
The division bench observed that the government should take immediate action to stop such incidents.
It directed the health secretary to file an affidavit and inform the bench details of blood donation camps held in government and private hospitals in the state.
The court also sought information with regards to the demand of blood in hospitals and quantity provided for by the blood banks.
The court directed the department to furnish the standard operating procedure to be formulated in terms of the National Blood Policy before the bench.
In the course of hearing, the bench ordered the government to inform it why advanced screening machines to conduct the Nucleic Acid Test (NAT) have not been installed in hospitals.
The NAT is essential for determining the quality of blood before transfusion to a patient and to ascertain the presence of HIV, the court was informed by social activist Atul Gera.
The bench also questioned the government on lapses on its part for not providing license to blood banks and why the matter was pending for over two years.
The court said that the present practice of procuring blood is to donate a unit in a blood bank by a donor, and pay for the required unit of blood.
Earlier, the court had initiated the PIL suo motu on the basis of a letter written by the parent of a thalassemia child who had received transfused blood.
The child allegedly contracted HIV through the contaminated blood, after which his father had written a letter to the Chief Justice who converted it into a PIL.
The Jharkhand government on October 26 had suspended the West Singhbhum civil surgeon and other officials concerned after it came to light that five children suffering from thalassemia tested HIV-positive in Chaibasa following blood transfusions.
A high-level probe is also underway following the suspension of officials at the direction of Chief Minister Hemant Soren.
The opposition BJP attacked the government, terming the incident "shameful" and a "state-sponsored attempt to murder children".
The suspension came after the family of a seven-year-old thalassemia patient alleged that the local blood bank in Chaibasa, the district headquarters of West Singhbhum, had transfused HIV-contaminated blood to their child.