Students Pricked with Needle Prescribed HIV Fighting Drugs

PHILADELPHIA, PA (AHN) - After being pricked with a diabetes-testing needle by a classmate, 19 elementary school students are taking drugs to fight the HIV virus - one student has already tested positive.

According to authorities, the child who tested positive for the HIV virus could not have contracted the disease from the needle.

Authorities also stated that the odds of the other children pricked with needle contracting the disease are low, however the drugs would reduce the amount of the virus in their blood or slow the progress of the disease. The drugs do not cure H.I.V. infection or prevent transmission of the virus.

"It may be in there, but it never gets a chance to set up cells in your body," Roger Pomerantz, head of the infectious-disease division at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, said of the drugs' effects on the virus.

The 8-year-old girl who stuck her Taylor Elementary schoolmates with her mother's needle on Wednesday was suspended and will probably be moved to another school.