Karachi Paediatric HIV Cases Surge as Hospitals Raise Alarm

Karachi has reported a troubling rise in paediatric HIV infections, with doctors and hospital sources warning that the number of children testing positive has climbed sharply over the past nine months. The increase, documented across three major hospitals in the city, has renewed concern that unsafe medical practices are continuing to expose children to a lifelong and preventable infection.

Data cited in the report shows the trend is not limited to a single facility. At the Sindh Infectious Diseases Hospital and Research Centre, 10 HIV-positive children were admitted in 2024, the number crossed 70 in 2025, and another 30 children had already been admitted in the opening months of 2026. At Indus Hospital, 144 HIV-positive patients were recorded in 2024, 176 in 2025, while 69 cases were reported in just the first quarter of this year.

Doctors say the paediatric pattern is especially alarming because many of these children were not infected through maternal transmission. Dr Samreen Sarfaraz of Indus Hospital said that since August 2025, 72 children below the age of 14 had been registered there, and 68 per cent of them were under five years old. Only a small share had HIV-positive mothers, while most had a history suggesting infection linked to treatment or medical intervention rather than transmission at birth.

Medical specialists believe the most likely drivers are unsafe healthcare practices, including the reuse of syringes, needles, intravenous sets and cannulas, along with poorly sterilised instruments and transfusion of unscreened blood. The warning is significant because it shifts attention away from narrow high-risk categories and toward systemic failures inside parts of the healthcare system. Doctors also noted that a preference for injections and drips over oral medicines can intensify the danger when basic infection control rules are ignored.

The situation is being made worse by treatment pressures. Clinicians say many children are arriving with advanced immune suppression and opportunistic infections, which makes care more difficult and complex. Pakistan also faces a shortage of key antiretroviral and anti-tuberculosis medicines after the suspension of USAID funding, raising fears that interruptions in treatment could increase illness, resistance and long-term harm for children already living with HIV.

A third major children’s hospital in Karachi has also detected more than 60 HIV-positive children, many of them from Thatta and other parts of interior Sindh. According to information cited in the report, several of these cases surfaced during pre-surgery screening. Sources familiar with the cases said many of the children had received repeated intramuscular injections over the previous year, reinforcing suspicions that infection may have spread through unsafe procedures rather than through household transmission.

The report also revived scrutiny of SITE town’s Kulsoom Bai Valika Social Security Hospital, where many of the children later treated elsewhere had previously received care. The facility saw an HIV outbreak affecting more than 80 children last year, with at least two reported deaths. That history has deepened concern among public health experts that earlier warnings were not translated into durable reform across hospitals and clinics.

Government officials did not publicly offer a full response in the report, although one official, speaking anonymously, argued that higher case numbers partly reflected stronger surveillance and better detection than in the past. Even so, experts say improved reporting alone cannot explain the scale and nature of the rise. They are calling for strict enforcement of injection safety rules, stronger oversight of hospitals and blood banks, and disciplinary action where malpractice is found.

The broader context is equally serious. Pakistan has already struggled with repeated HIV outbreaks, including the major Ratodero crisis in 2019 that infected large numbers of children and exposed deep failures in infection control. Health specialists now warn that Karachi’s latest numbers show those lessons were not fully absorbed. Unless authorities move quickly to tighten regulation, secure medicine supplies and restore public confidence in safe treatment, more children could be placed at risk by the very healthcare system meant to protect them.