According to a report, an Indian husband was forced to deliver his wife’s baby after doctors refused to touch the HIV-positive woman.
The husband told India’s NDTV news channel he carried out the delivery as doctors at Meerut Medical College and Hospital in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh shouted instructions from a distance. “They came but simply stood in a line and asked me to pull out the baby and cut the umbilical cord,” said the 28-year-old man, described as a poor painter, in Meerut town, 65 kilometres from the Indian capital New Delhi.
The hospital “asked me to clean up all the blood and burn the waste,” the man said. “The doctors were not coming,” his wife told NDTV, a day after the delivery of the couple’s fourth child. Hospital officials dismissed the couple’s complaints when questioned by NDTV. “How can I believe what he said?” said Abhilasha Gupta, head of the medical school’s gynaecology department. “These days those who have HIV think they will get media sympathy by blaming others.”
But officials from India’s National Aids Control Organisation (NCAO) expressed shock at the report and said it would be investigated. “In this particular case we have recommended stringent action against the doctors,” NACO chief Sujatha Rao told the channel. “Even if they were to touch contaminated blood, they are not in danger.”
It’s amazing how dedicated this man is to his wife and unborn child.
Aren’t there protocols that doctor’s must follow if they come in contact with a person who is infected with HIV?
This story just shocks me! I have worked with HIV positive patients in the past and if the proper precautions are taken, there is no risk of becoming infected. In any type of field of medicine all professionals should consider everyone to have every disease out there. I always did. That way the same precautions are taken for everybody. It amazes how people freak out when they know someone is HIV positive. But in reality there are a lot of people walking around who don’t know they have it, or do not admit to having it for this exact reason. People don’t realize they are more at risk for contracting Hepatitis than HIV.
i agreed with the Doctor, why should he put himself and others at risk…….. when they know these people have HIV, the doctors jobs are hard enough without being put in this position!