HIV donor crisis in Chicago

Federal officials are investigating in Chicago, what three hospitals knew and whether or not they told four organ transplant patients about a high-risk donor who infected them with HIV. There is a law that says even if the tests come back negative, a patients is to be informed of any rick factors known to the hospital regarding possible infection of the donor. Gift of Hope Organ & Tissue Donor Network, the place that gathered the organs, told authorities that the hospitals were informed of the donors high risk behaviors upon getting the organs. Weather or not the hospitals fallowed protocol and then informed the patients has not yet been confirmed. The hospitals refuse to release and statement of what the patients were told, what organs they received, or what other care they got siting confidentiality. one of the infected patients, a female in cook county, filed a petition to keep the university of Chicago and Gift of Hope from destroying any documents pertaining to the transplants. She received a kidney from the donor that infected her with HIV. The tests that were don't on the organs came back negative for the virus but experts say it is likely the donor got the disease a few weeks before he died making direction with the method used impossible. the other way of testing which can detect the virus sooner costs more and there for was not used. The female patient says she was never informed of the donors risk by the hospital only that the test was negative and every thing was fine. chef medical examiner of Chicago's public health says she hopes this instance will make the newer test become the norm, cost or not. this is the first time HIV has been passed through organ donation since 1986.