In addition to getting infection from mothers, the reuse of disposable syringes is the major reason for the HIV/AIDS outbreak in children.
Normally, major hospitals follow SOPs, but there are incidents of volunteers reusing syringes after injecting a child, potentially contaminating the medicine. In that case, even fresh syringes have no advantages as the used medicine is contaminated.
According to a BBC report, Mohammed Amin was eight when he died shortly after testing positive for HIV. Not long after her brother contracted the virus, Asma was also diagnosed with HIV. Her family believes both children contracted it from injections with contaminated needles during routine medical treatment at THQ Hospital Taunsa.
They are two of the 331 children that BBC Eye has identified as testing positive for HIV in the city between November 2024 and October 2025.
Dr Gul Qaisrani, a doctor at a local private clinic, was the first to spot the outbreak in late 2024 after noticing a rise in the number of children going through his clinic who tested positive for HIV. Almost all of the 65 to 70 children he diagnosed had been treated at THQ Taunsa, he says.
He recalls one mother telling him that her daughter was injected with the same syringe as a cousin living with HIV, and that the syringe was then used on several other children. Qaisrani says a father told him he challenged syringe reuse at THQ Taunsa but was ignored by nurses.
During 32 hours of undercover filming at THQ Taunsa in late 2025, the BBC team witnessed syringes being reused on multi-dose vials of medicine on 10 separate occasions, potentially contaminating the drugs inside. “Even if they have attached a new needle, the back part, which we call the syringe body, has the virus in it, so it will transfer even with a new needle,” said Dr Altaf Ahmed, a consultant microbiologist.
BBC Eye has pieced together data from the Punjab provincial Aids screening programme, private clinics, and a data set leaked by police to identify 331 children who tested positive for HIV in the city of Taunsa between November 2024 and October 2025.
Out of a sample of 97 children with HIV whose families were also tested, only four of their mothers tested positive. This suggests very few of these cases were caused by mother-to-child transmission. The mother of Mohammed Amin and Asma, Sughra, tested negative for HIV – her husband died two years ago in a road traffic accident.
The provincial Aids screening programme data lists “contaminated needle” as the mode for transmission in more than half of all these 331 cases, including Asma’s – for the others, the mode is not listed.
