Hospital to pay for AIDS death
An Athens public hospital has been ordered to pay nearly 300,000 euros in compensation to the parents of a girl who contracted AIDS through a blood transfusion 16 years ago, in a court decision made public yesterday. The Council of State, Greece’s highest administrative court, upheld an appeals court decision awarding the couple 293,500 euros for the anguish caused by the death of their daughter, who as a thalassemia sufferer required blood transfusions four times a year. Anastassia Pouri – who died of AIDS in 1996, aged 21 – was infected with the HIV virus at the Aghia Sophia children’s hospital. The court found hospital authorities guilty of negligence for not having checked the blood the girl received. In 1998 the same court awarded 160 million drachmas (470,000 euros) to the parents of an 11-year-old AIDS victim who contracted HIV at the Rhodes public hospital. Greece had the highest incidence of HIV transmission through blood transfusions in the European Union between 1981 and 2001.
