Police have detained the director of a Chinese hospital where at least 64 people were infected with the potentially deadly liver disease Hepatitis C after receiving transfusions from blood collected illegally, state media reported.
The infections were discovered in September after a patient who had received a transfusion during an operation tested positive for the disease, a news agency reported on Wednesday.
The hospital in the southwestern city of Pingtang traced the transfusion to a donor in another province who had sold as many as 20 litres of blood to the hospital from 1998 to 2002.
Further tests showed that by Tuesday, 64 patients had been infected with hepatitis C through blood transfusions from the donor, who was a hepatitis C carrier, the report said.
The agency said director Li Changhe was detained on suspicion of illegally collecting and providing blood.
A woman who answered the phone at the hospital on Thursday said no one was available to comment. Police in Pingtang said they were not authorised to speak to the media and referred questions to the county government, where calls rang unanswered.
Hepatitis C results in the swelling of the liver and can cause stomach pain, fatigue and jaundice.
