TN govt to pay Rs 40 lakh to mom, son who got HIV from infected hospital blood

MADURAI: The Tamil Nadu Government has agreed to pay Rs 40 lakh as ex gratia assistance to a woman and her minor son who contracted HIV after a blood transfusion at a government hospital in Tiruchy in 2022, after the Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court directed the State to consider enhancing the compensation.

Justice C Saravanan directed the government to pay Rs 20 lakh to the woman within two weeks. The Rs 20 lakh earmarked for her son must be invested in an interest-bearing fixed deposit in a nationalised bank or post office until he turns 18. The mother may approach the court for permission to withdraw the amount earlier, if she needs it for the child’s welfare or in an emergency, the court said.

On October 22, 2022, the woman was admitted to the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Government Hospital in Tiruchy for delivery. When complications arose, she was given blood from the hospital’s blood bank. She subsequently contracted HIV, and her newborn son was also found to have contracted the infection.

In a writ petition, the woman said she and her newborn contracted the virus from the infected blood from the hospital and sought compensation for medical negligence.

In a counter affidavit, the hospital dean and the project director/member secretary of the Tamil Nadu State AIDS Control Society, Chennai, admitted that the donor was in the “window period” when the blood was collected, and that the infection was not detected during screening.

The window period is the interval after infection when the virus is present but cannot be detected yet by standard tests.

The authorities, however, said the hospital had followed the protocols laid down by the National Blood Transfusion Council and TANSACS for screening blood and blood products at the time of donation. The donor’s blood tested negative at the time of donation, and neither the donor nor the hospital knew of his infection, they said.

“It is respectfully submitted that it is an agreeable submission that the petitioner and her baby have been affected at large, leaving them with irreparable health conditions. But it has not happened with ill or willful intention and we don’t not have a scientific system to identify window period infections in blood products,” the authorities said.

To show the screening details, the government produced an internal communication of the respondents. It said the donor’s blood, collected on October 14, 2022, was screened for all transfusion-transmissible infections as per the Drugs and Cosmetics Act standards and found non-reactive. This sequence of events strongly suggests that the donor was likely in the "window period" at the time of donation, when the HIV virus was present but not yet detectable by standard screening tests.

Hence, the respondents argued they could not be held responsible for the infection of the woman or her child.

The court had earlier directed the authorities to pay Rs 2.5 lakh as interim ex gratia assistance to mitigate the hardships faced by the woman and her child. The amount was paid on August 28, 2026. In a subsequent interim order on September 15, the court asked the authorities to consider enhanced compensation, taking into account the serious consequences of the infection for both the woman and her child.

Following these directions, the government agreed to provide a total of Rs 40 lakh as ex gratia assistance, with Rs 20 lakh each earmarked for the woman and her son. The court recorded the government’s undertaking and disposed of the writ petition on September 28.