In light of the recent HIV organ transplant incident that occurred in Taiwan, the Taiwan Centers for Disease Control (Taiwan CDC) is proposing to amend the “HIV Infection Control and Patient Rights Protection Act” in order to reinforce the prevention of HIV transmission by blood. The amendments will include the following.
1. Legalization of the counseling interview process: Require all medical facilities, including blood donor centers and organ procurement hospitals, to conduct a counseling interview with the blood, organ, body fluid or cell donor and authorize competent authorities to standardize the contents, scope and operating procedures of the interview in order to legalize the existing counseling interview process.
2. Reporting of HIV-positive donors or transplant recipients:Include the standard operating procedures for medical facilities to report the discovery of HIV-positive status in a donor or transplant recipient after the transplant or transfusion in order to facilitate timely interventions by competent authorities when necessary.
3. Penalization of blood donors who provide false information: To ensure the safety of blood recipients and prevent the transmission of HIV by blood, all blood donors are required to tell the truth during the counseling interview and any blood donor who is found to give inaccurate information during the interview will be fined.

To rebut recent claims made by some press that Taiwan CDC plans to lift the current ban on HIV organ transplants, the agency says those claims are false and misleading and the agency has not planned to remove the ban on such organ transplants.