NELLORE: District medical and health officer K Masilamani probing the supply of ‘HIV-infected’ blood to a pregnant woman by the Indian Red Cross Society (IRCS) Blood Bank, collected the blood samples of the woman and her child again on Wednesday. The blood samples have been sent to Chennai for the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test, which is an advanced test to determine the HIV infection and the window period. Available only in Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai and other metros, the PCR test costs around `2,000.According to sources, the DM&HO officials have given a clean chit to the IRCS Blood Bank in their preliminary inquiry report submitted to the district collector. But in view of the apprehensions raised by the woman and her relatives as well as people’s organisations, the collector ordered them to conduct further probe. Meanwhile, the woman and her child were administered Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) on Wednesday at the district headquarters hospital. The IRCS authorities are likely to be asked to re-conduct tests on the donors of blood who donated the three units of ‘O’ positive blood on September 30 at the blood bank, which was administered to the pregnant woman during a caesarean operation at Triveni Hospitals on November 2. Dr Vijay Kumar, a member of the fact-finding committee, formed by the people’s organisations to look into the matter, opined that the HIV virus in the blood administered to the pregnant woman might not have been detected at the IRCS. It is advisable to re-conduct tests on the donors of the ‘O’ positive blood on September 30 at the IRCS blood bank as part of the probe to determine whether there is any human error, he said. The collector met finance minister Anam Ramanarayan Reddy and apprised him of the details pertaining to the case. It is learnt that the DM&HO has been asked to form a committee to probe the case.
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