Over 300 HIV-infected children die in four years after diagnosis in Sindh

ISLAMABAD: As many as 324 children infected with HIV in Sindh, mostly in the city of Larkana and its suburbs, have died so far due to complications of the disease since world’s largest HIV outbreak among children was reported in the Ratodero Town of Sindh in April 2019, officials said.

“Around 324 children including 207 boys and 117 girls have lost their lives due to complications of HIV and opportunistic infections in Sindh till February 15, 2023. These children had tested positive for HIV during last four years and many of them were under treatment for HIV”, an official of the Sindh health department told The News on Wednesday.

So far 2,865 children have tested positive for HIV in Sindh, the majority in Ratodero Taluka of Larkana as well as Garhi Khero, Garhi Yasin and Sujawal Junjeo Talukas, which are adjacent to each other and known as the ‘hub of HIV-infected children’ in Sindh. According to the Sindh health department data available with The News, of the 324 HIV-positive children who have died in the area since April 2019, around 164 died during the last year, between January 2022 to February 15, 2023. Till January 2022, only 160 children infected with HIV had died in the area since the outbreak was reported.

Citing the official data, officials in the Sindh health department said of the 2,865 children infected with HIV in Sindh, 1672 are boys while 1193 are girls, adding that the age of most of the HIV-positive children is up to 15 years. As HIV has spread to the general population in the Ratodero town of Larkana and adjoining areas, people are continuously being tested positive for HIV and in the first two months of the current year, 64 people have tested positive for HIV including 17 children officials said and blamed the reuse of syringes, infected blood and poor infection and control practices for the spread of HIV in the area.

Commenting on the deaths of children infected with HIV in Sindh, renowned pediatric infectious diseases expert Dr Fatima Mir said TB was the major cause of death among children infected with HIV, adding that there were several other comorbidities or diseases that led to the deaths of these children. “First of all, these children were malnourished as they belong to extremely poor families, who don’t have enough to feed them. Most of the HIV-positive children were anaemic, which means that their hemoglobulin level was much below than the normal range which is 12-15 g/dL”, she informed. According to her, most of the HIV-infected children were also infected with Hepatic B &C while many of them were also suffering from other “opportunistic infections”.

Dr Fatima who had predicted the death of around 50 percent of the HIV-positive children within a year or two after the Ratodero was reported in April 2019, said only 11.30percent of children had died due to complications of the infectious disease, which was a “great achievement” of the officials associated with the HIV/AIDS control program in Sindh.

“Lack of awareness among parents of HIV-infected children is the main cause of deaths of children in Larkana as people don’t take their children to the HIV treatment centre regularly”, says Gulbahar Shaikh, a resident of Ratodero area of Larkana, whose daughter is also HIV positive.

He maintained that children infected with HIV not only need Anti-Retroviral Therapy (ART) drugs regularly but they also need medicines for other infections and diseases, need food and iron supplements and regular check-ups but many parents were not consistent and due to the virus becoming active in their bodies and they die after contracting opportunistic infections, especially TB.

Due to the continuous spread of HIV in Larkana and adjoining districts, Dr Ershad Kazmi has written a letter to the Director General Health Sindh for the establishment of an Infection Prevention and Control cell in Sindh, saying Sindh Healthcare Commission was supposed to eliminate quackery but it has miserably failed to fulfil its responsibilities including the implementation of IPC guidelines and recommendations.