As a National AIDS Control Organisation team visiting Junagadh Civil Hospital was winding up last week’s probe into how 23 children with thalassaemia had contracted HIV, the father of one child was a few steps away. Yet he was too busy and too tired to care about the cause any longer, all his efforts now concentrated on the treatment of his four-month-old daughter.

“For two months, I did move from pillar to post to find out how my daughter had contracted HIV,” said Salim Sheikh, 32, who went to Gandhinagar three times in 20 days to take up the matter of the 23 children.

“Now my girl’s health is failing and she needs my complete attention. Teams will come and go. But my daughter has a fever and her blood transfusion too is due. I need to take her to a doctor,” said Sheikh, who runs a tea stall right outside the hospital but who showed no interest in what the probe team was doing, even when it called him.

The parents of many of the 23 children, who tested HIV-positive between January and August, failed to meet the team. Barely educated and struggling to make ends meet, most live in villages across Junagadh district and had registered their children with the hospital, the closest and the most affordable facility for the blood transfusions that are needed periodically.

“We cannot afford to travel to Junagadh so frequently. That costs us almost a day’s meal. I would rather save it for my son’s medical bills,” said a daily wager from Vanthli whose son has tested HIV-positive and who now fears that this will threaten his younger daughter’s future.