Haitian Refugee AIDS Tests Render Large Rate of Error

Because of problems in identifying and handling blood samples, AIDS testing of Haitian immigrants at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay has had an error rate more than 80 times that of other large U.S. screening programs, according to Public Health Service documents.

“Inconsistencies in . . . results in this mass screening of refugees have important public health implications,” wrote Dr. Paul V. Effler, a physician with the federal Centers for Disease Control, in a memo to Assistant Surgeon General Alan Hinman, a copy of which was obtained by The Times.

“Important decisions have been made, and continue to be made, on the basis of HIV test results that are unreliable by standards in the United States,” he wrote.

U.S. immigration law requires people seeking permanent entry to the United States to be tested for AIDS infection. Rules prohibit infected individuals from establishing permanent residence here.

Military officials confirmed that there have been problems conducting the tests, in part because many of the largely illiterate Haitians were exchanging the plastic identification bracelets they were issued upon arrival, resulting in the mislabeling of blood specimens. In other cases, samples were damaged.

Standard procedure involves several rounds of testing if the initial test is positive. Typically, a test known as the ELISA is performed first. Because of a high rate of false positive results with this test, it is performed a second time if the first test is positive. If the second result is positive, a more accurate--and expensive--test, known as the Western Blot, is performed to confirm the results. If that test is positive, the individual is considered infected.

“No one’s making an excuse for what’s happening to this stuff,” one official said. “There were some (instances) where something happened. But we don’t know if they were false positives. We don’t know whether we drew blood both times from the same person.”

The military said it has now switched to a system of photo IDs.