ORPHANS TO RECEIVE $120,000 SETTLEMENT.Byline: Daily News Staff and Wire Services Los Angeles Los Angeles (lôs ăn`jələs, lŏs, ăn`jəlēz'), city (1990 pop. 3,485,398), seat of Los Angeles co., S Calif.; inc. 1850. County will pay $120,000 to the teen-age children of a couple who died of AIDS the woman contracted through a 1985 blood transfusion blood transfusion, transfer of blood from one person to another, or from one animal to another of the same species. Transfusions are performed to replace a substantial loss of blood and as supportive treatment in certain diseases and blood disorders. at High Desert Hospital. County supervisors voted 5-0 without comment Tuesday to accept a county Claims Board recommendation to pay the orphans because their mother was not immediately counseled about the risk of passing on HIV HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus), either of two closely related retroviruses that invade T-helper lymphocytes and are responsible for AIDS. There are two types of HIV: HIV-1 and HIV-2. HIV-1 is responsible for the vast majority of AIDS in the United States. to her husband. Both parents died of complications related to acquired immune deficiency syndrome Acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) A viral disease of humans caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which attacks and compromises the body's immune system. . The mother died at age 26 in February 1991. The father died at 33 in February 1996. Their children, a 16-year-old boy and a 14-year-old girl, live with their father's sister. The children and their father received a $169,000 settlement after the mother's death - $70,000 paid by the American Red Cross American Red Cross: see Red Cross. and $99,000 paid by the county. After the father died, the children sued the county and the American Red Cross again. According to documents filed with the Claims Board, the American Red Cross is set to pay an additional $80,000. In 1985, the woman got a transfusion of blood from the Red Cross at the county hospital in Lancaster. The following year, ``she was informed (the blood may have been tainted), however, she was not counseled regarding (the risks associated) with sex,'' the reports states. Several days later, the woman was found to be HIV positive, but ``again was not counseled regarding the risk of transmitting HIV through unprotected sex.'' ``It's just a sad, sad case,'' said Tom Moser, the children's attorney. ``The kids lost both their parents to AIDS.'' The American Red Cross started screening blood they donated to hospitals three months after the mother received 10 units of blood January 24, 1985, for treatment of an illness, Moser said. According to a memorandum to the Claims Board written by Gary Miller, an attorney for the county, the Red Cross determined in May 1986 that one of the units of blood provided to High Desert Hospital was contaminated contaminated, v 1. made radioactive by the addition of small quantities of radioactive material. 2. made contaminated by adding infective or radiographic materials. 3. an infective surface or object. with the human immunodeficiency virus human immunodeficiency virus n. HIV. Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) A transmissible retrovirus that causes AIDS in humans. . |
|
||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion