An organ recipient recently contracted the virus that causes AIDS from a live kidney donor in an unidentified city hospital, the New York State Department of Health said Tuesday.
It’s the nation’s first documented case of HIV transmission via a transplant from a living donor since a sensitive test for the virus was approved and implemented for donor screening in 1985, a health department spokeswoman said.
The hospital followed acceptable protocols in an initial screening of the donor, the spokeswoman said, but the donor apparently had unsafe sex after the test and prior to donating the organ.
“Of course this is a rare case, but we felt like we needed to alert centers to this possibility so they can talk to potential donors about risks and do testing closer to the time of surgery,” she added.
Full story: Organ recipient gets HIV