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    Hospital Held Responsible in Death of Elderly Woman With HIV

    Yu Liangyou, who was exposed to the virus during blood transfusions, died months before Hunan court announced its verdict.

    Following the death of an elderly woman who became infected with HIV during a blood transfusion, a court in central China has determined that the center that supplied the blood and the hospital that treated her are 70 percent responsible, and must pay over 295,000 yuan ($43,400) in compensation to members of her family.

    In 2010, Yu Liangyou, one of China’s many left-behind seniors, was admitted to the First Affiliated Hospital of the University of South China in Hunan province to receive a transfusion because of a shortage of platelets in her blood. Yu continued to receive transfusions until 2014, when her condition, which had remained fairly stable during the first few years of treatment, began to worsen. When her family learned that she had somehow contracted HIV, they were shocked.

    Believing the infection was the result of the blood transfusions, Yu’s family filed a lawsuit against the hospital; its blood supplier, Hengyang Blood Center; and two companies that provided the blood to the center. According to The Paper, Sixth Tone’s sister publication, Yu was likely to have contracted HIV during eight blood transfusions she received over the course of three months in 2014. All of the blood she received during this time came from the Hengyang Blood Center.

    Last month, the intermediate people’s court of Hengyang ruled that the First Affiliated Hospital and the blood center should assume 70 percent responsibility for the woman’s death with respect to paying compensation, while Yu’s family should bear the remaining 30 percent.

    The case was officially accepted by the court in January 2015, when Yu was still alive. But afterward, her condition quickly deteriorated: She developed a severe ulcer in her mouth that made it difficult for her to eat, and she began passing blood in her urine. Four months later — before she was able to hear the court’s verdict — Yu passed away at the age of 71.

    According to Yu’s lawyer, Yang Heguang, the family suspected that Yu had been infected with HIV through contaminated medical equipment — likely reused or improperly sterilized needles. He told Sixth Tone that when Yu’s family members confronted the hospital, they were told that all of the transfusion equipment used on Yu had been destroyed.

    An administrator at the hospital, Xiao Licai, told local media that staff had conducted an internal investigation upon discovering Yu’s infection and found that their procedure for blood transfusions followed national guidelines. Xiao also said that the tubes and needles used on Yu were disposed of in accordance with standard procedure for medical waste.

    But after considering the evidence and hearing witness testimonies, the court concluded that Yu had in fact been infected while receiving blood transfusions at the hospital. However, because an autopsy had not been performed, the court added that the cause of death could not be legally verified, and that the family would therefore bear some of the responsibility.

    The court ruled that the hospital and the blood center should assume 50 and 20 percent responsibility, respectively, for paying compensation to Yu’s family because they were not able to prove that they were not responsible for the patient’s death.

    Yang said Yu’s family will continue to appeal the decision. “The medical fees for Yu’s HIV treatment were too high, considering these medications are basically provided free of charge in China,” he said. “In addition, it’s absurd that the plaintiffs should assume 30 percent responsibility. How can these rural patients be aware of the importance of an autopsy without being properly informed?”

    Beginning with an outbreak in rural Henan in the early 1980s, China has had a devastating, often troubling history with HIV. A pervasive social stigma manifests in workplace discrimination, segregation of schools and prisons, violations of personal privacy, and even domestic violence. There have also been several high-profile cases of hospitals refusing to treat HIV-positive patients — especially those who identify as gay — despite being obliged to do so by the State Council. And in separate cases earlier this year, five patients in Zhejiang and a baby born in Sichuan were exposed to HIV due to hospital staff misconduct.

    Contributions: David Paulk; editor: David Paulk.

    (Header image: Yu Liangyou sits on her bed in the hematology ward at the First Affiliated Hospital of the University of South China in Hengyang, Hunan province, Aug. 26, 2014. Courtesy of Chen Zheng)