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British Aids charities say govt prompted HIV panic

LONDON: British charities accused the government on Saturday of causing panic by announcing problems with an HIV blood test over a holiday weekend, leaving thousands of worried people without access to clinics and doctors.

The health ministry said on Friday that some 20,000 people who were given the all-clear would need to be re-tested after doubts about the reliability of the device manufactured by Chicago-based drug company Abbott Laboratories Inc.

Abbott stopped selling the test on March 25 after at least four cases were reported where the test showed negative results on patients known to have the HIV virus that causes Aids.

"It is very unfortunate that the problem with this test was not made available to Aids charities and hospitals as soon as it was known," said Nick Partridge, chief executive of the Terrence Higgins Trust.

"We are now in a position where people have been left in a situation of panic over the holiday weekend," Partridge said.

Aids charities said hundreds of worried callers were jamming their helplines for advice and they had called in extra helpers to cope with the demand.

Executive director of London Lighthouse, Susie Parsons, said information about problems with the test should have been made available sooner.

"I think letting people know through the press in a panic over a holiday weekend is not the way to go about it," Parsosn told reporters.

The health ministry defended its decision not to make the information public sooner.

"We were planning to make the situation public next week when more detailed arrangements, including the arrangements that each local clinic would need, could be put into place," Graham Winyard, the government's deputy chief medical officer, told BBC radio.

"It is very unfortunate that this has come out now and undoubtedly a lot of unnecessary distress will have been caused," he added.

Partridge said that one person every three hours is diagnosed with HIV in Britain.

"The number of people tested inaccurately will probably be very small but they will have to wait until Tuesday for any information," he said.

Partridge said the wait for information would be made worse by the fact that hospitals and test centres will be inundated with six months' worth of tests to re-analyse.

"There will be a tremendous pressure on laboratory services next week," he said.-Reuter