Sunday Times (Johannesburg) - January 14, 2001
Justice Malala: London
Health chiefs apparently detected the nurses' HIV status through checks carried out on their arrival in Britain from subSaharan Africa to take up places at the Wolverhampton School of Nursing and Midwifery about 18 months ago.
They were allowed to stay on the course.
Although authorities have refused to disclose the affected nurses' home countries, The Sun newspaper said some of the 10 are "known to be from Zimbabwe". The rest are speculated to be from neighbouring countries.
"The trainees are from a part of Africa where HIV infection and AIDS are rampant. . . All are from a region in which one in four of the adult population has been infected with HIV," the mass-selling tabloid said.
Thousands of nurses from South Africa and other countries are recruited to Britain every year to shore up the country's creaking health system.
Wolverhampton Health Authority confirmed that between five and 10 men and women with the virus were either working at hospitals in the city or completing a three-year nursing course. There are 180 Africans among the college's 1 600 students.
None of the HIV-positive nurses is working in "high-risk procedures" such as operations, and to protect confidentiality patients will not be told which of the staff and students are HIV positive.
A Conservative Party health spokesman, Liam Fox, said: "Not only are they [the government] raiding the Third World for nurses but they may be putting patients' lives at risk."
However, Health Minister Gisela Stuart said "just because someone carries the HIV virus doesn't mean they develop fullblown AIDS. There are very careful procedures so that they [the nurses] are not working in high-risk areas.
"There have not been any cases where a patient has been infected by a healthcare worker," she said.
Jane Eminson, chief executive of Wolverhampton Health Authority, said: "I am happy that everything in this case has been done correctly and we are acting within those guidelines.
"The risk of people getting HIV from unprotected sex or needles is far higher than contracting it from medical staff.
"They are continuing their training but because of their condition they will not be undertaking any high-risk procedures like working in operating theatres."
A health department spokesman said the nurses posed no risk to the public.
Derek Bodell, chief executive of the National Aids Trust, said: "There is no risk to patients in Wolverhampton as the nurses are not involved in any invasive procedures.
"In this day and age, given everything we know about how difficult it is for HIV to be transmitted, the public does not have a right to know if someone is HIV positive except under the most unusual circumstances, as it is a gross infringement of their right to privacy."
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