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The Issue:
On August 2, 1998, twin girls were born in Benghazi, Libya. A month later, one of the babies got seriously ill. The father took the baby to the local children's hospital. The baby stayed at it only for four hours. She had a blood test made and the results were good. At the end of October, a social worker visited the home of the twins and insisted on conducting new tests, saying the baby might have been infected with viral hepatitis. The baby's twin sister and mother were also tested. The results showed that the baby who had spent four hours at the Benghazi children's hospital was infected with the AIDS virus.
A boy born on June 20, 1998 in Benghazi was admitted to the children's hospital at the end of July. A little later the boy was discharged, and in October medical professionals of the same hospital took blood samples from the baby and his mother and sent them to Egypt for testing. The results showed that the boy was infected with the AIDS virus.
These are two of the stories told by fathers of children infected with HIV at the children's hospital in Benghazi which the Libyan magazine La carried in November 1998.
Having learned about the interest towards their tragedy, several fathers of HIV-infected children went to the offices of the magazine. One of them went there right after the funeral of his little son, with clods of earth still clinging to his shoes. According to his own account, his son was admitted to the children's hospital on September 24, 1998 and discharged six days later. The child got worse. The father of another sick child told him his son was on the list of 42 children infected with HIV.
After these stories, the La magazine folded. The findings of its investigative reporters show that the first child infected with the AIDS virus was registered in June 1998. Another three cases were registered in July. At the end of November, there already were 50 children infected with AIDS. In the meantime, some of them died.
Rumours started to spread in Benghazi. The local residents panicked. People said there was incidence of AIDS at the children's hospital. However, the hospital workers not only avoided to conduct AIDS tests but persistently concealed the results of the few made, La wrote. Infected children's parents filed complaints with the head physician and the regional ministry of health but did not receive any reply. Several desperate fathers broke in at a medical conference held in Benghazi and made an appeal to Libya's leader Muammar Qaddafi.
The personal drama of those people became know to the public. An investigation was launched to find the culprits. The investigative reporters of La established the following facts: there was a shortage of consumables at the Benghazi children's hospital, disposable instruments were repeatedly used, no AIDS tests were conducted and basic rules of hygiene were merely not observed. As most parents were not informed that their children had been infected with HIV, the children were treated as if they were not ill at all and this led to the spread of the disease. At the same time - in the autumn of 1998, it was alleged for the first time that the children had been infected deliberately as part of a conspiracy against the Libyan state. A hunt for the conspirators was launched.
The physicians and the other members of the personnel of the hospital, which employed a lot of foreigners, too, were questioned. Already in December 1998 several medical nurses, including two Bulgarian ones, were detained for interrogation. One of the Bulgarian nurses was Snezhana Dimitrova. A few days later, all of them were released.
In February 1999, another group of medical workers were detained in connection with the investigation into the AIDS scandal at the Benghazi children's hospital. There were 23 Bulgarians in that group. Most of the medics were released a few days later. The Bulgarian nurses Kristiana Vulcheva, Nassya Nenova, Valentina Siropoulo, Valya Chervenyashka and Snezhana Dimitrova, as well as Dr Zdravko Georgiev, remained in custody. Two of the nurses, Kristiana and Nassya, made confessions which they later retracted.
In the spring of 1999, Libyan children infected with HIV were sent for diagnosing to clinics in Paris, Geneva and Milan. The specialists, including Dr Luc Montaigner of the Institut Pasteur, who discovered the AIDS virus, and virologist Dr Luc Perrin of Geneva University Hospital, established that part of the children, 47 per cent, had been infected with hepatitis C, and 33 per cent with hepatitis B and that some of tem were infected with various combinations of HIV and hepatitis C or B. The clinical tests also revealed the presence of at least two varieties of HIV and four subgroups of hepatitis C, showing that children who had already been ill were admitted to the hospital which led to the emergence of a focus of infection. The experts concluded that the AIDS infection was nosocamial.
On February 7, 2000, six Bulgarians, nine Libyan nationals and a Palestinian - all of them working in the administration and the management of the Benghazi hospital, were charged with deliberately infecting 393 Libyan children with AIDS by injecting them infected products. The Bulgarians were also charged with the perpetration of acts incompatible with Libyan norms and traditions. The law court held 11 hearings without considering the case on the merits. The case records total some 1,600 pages.
Since June 2000, around 200 Libyan children have been receiving treatment in clinics in Milan and Rome. Their stay in Italy is kept secret. The children are accompanied by their parents. The Italian doctors and nurses are silent because, in their own words, they have promised to the Libyan authorities to maintain confidentiality. Libya has signed a contract for a course of treatment for indefinite duration. The disclosures were made by the Italian magazine Diario in February 2001.
In March 2001, Dr Luc Montaigner visited the Italian clinics that provide treatment for the Libyan children. The defence lawyers of the Bulgarian medics hope that his position, as well as the opinion of Dr Luc Perrin and the Italian doctors in charge of the children, will make the Libyan prosecuting authorities retract the charges of deliberate infection of children with AIDS that will carry the severest penalty - all the medics will be sentenced to death.
The Beginning
On February 10, 1999, the Bulgarian Embassy in Tripoli was first alerted that 23 Bulgarian medics working in a hospital in Benghazi had been taken by bus to an unknown destination. Representations were made to the competent authorities, and on February 13 the Bulgarian Consul found that the medics had been detained in connection with an investigation into an increased incidence of AIDS at the pediatric hospital in Benghazi. It emerged that back in the autumn of 1998 Bulgarian citizens had been briefly detained and questioned on the same matter.
Also on February 13, 1999, the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry issued its first press release on the case. Fifteen of the 23 detained Bulgarian citizens were released on February 16. A working group of the Ministry left for Libya and delivered to the Libyan Foreign Minister a message from Bulgarian Foreign Minister Nadezhda Mihailova.
On March 7, 1999, the Libyan State formally notified Bulgaria that six Bulgarians were held at the pleasure of the investigating authorities in connection with a case of HIV infection of children: nurses Nassya Nenova, Valentina Siropoulo, Valya Chervenyashka, Snezhana Dimitrova and Kristiyana Vulcheva, and Dr Zdravko Georgiev.
