▲ HIV Testing
An incident has occurred at a hospital in Pakistan where 78 children were infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) all at once.
According to reports from the British daily The Telegraph and other sources on July 7, Saeed Ghani, the labor minister for the government of Sindh province in southern Pakistan, stated the previous day that at least 78 children had been infected with HIV at the Kulsum Bai Valika Hospital, a government-run facility in the region.
Minister Ghani promised to investigate the cause of the infections and hold those responsible strictly accountable.
The provincial government's stance comes after parents of the infected children spent months struggling to resolve the issue.
When the suspicions of child infections first emerged in November of last year, the parents urged the provincial government to conduct an independent investigation. After their requests were ignored, they filed a petition with the Sindh High Court.
On July 2, the High Court pressured the provincial government, ordering it to submit a report within two weeks explaining the reasons for the HIV infections at the hospital, and pointed out that the hospital has a legal obligation to provide safe medical treatment.
Tariq Mansoor, who filed the petition, argued in court, "We have been running around trying to solve this problem, but the provincial government has given us no hope," adding, "The children contracted HIV after contaminated disposable syringes were reused at the hospital."
On July 5, the parents held a rally in front of a building housing a journalists' association in Karachi, the capital of Sindh province, claiming that approximately 200 children had been infected with HIV at the hospital and that at least nine of them had died.
They demanded that the hospital be held accountable and that lifelong treatment be provided for the infected children.
The number of children infected with HIV is surging in Sindh province.
According to authorities, the number of infected children increased from 10 in 2024 to 70 in 2025.
Between January and March of this year, 329 out of 894 patients registered as HIV-positive in Sindh province were children.
The Pakistan Medical Association pointed out that the rise in HIV infections among children in Sindh province signifies a failure of infection control by the authorities, noting that unsafe practices, including the reuse of syringes at unlicensed hospitals, are a serious public health concern.
In April 2019, a private hospital in the city of Ratodero, Sindh province, saw a surge in HIV infections among children, suspected to be caused by the reuse of syringes, with the number of infected children reaching approximately 800 two months later.
At the time, the World Health Organization identified the reuse of contaminated syringes as the key factor in the outbreak through an investigation.
HIV infections among children in Pakistan have been on a nationwide upward trend for several years.
At the end of 2024, a government hospital in the northeastern province of Punjab also reported an increase in the number of pediatric HIV patients.
The United Nations estimates that the number of HIV-infected individuals in Pakistan, including children, surged from 67,000 in 2010 to 310,000 in 2023, but The Telegraph reported that the actual number of infections is likely much higher.
(Photo: Yonhap News TV capture, Yonhap News)
※
Copying, redistribution, and unauthorized use in AI training are strictly prohibited.