TOKYO - Japan's former leading AIDS expert, Mr Takeshi Abe (80), will go on trial today in connection with a scandal involving the use of HIV tainted blood products on haemophiliacs. Nearly 400 haemophiliacs treated with unheated blood in the 1980s have died of AIDS and AIDS related complications.
The case involves allegations of a government cover up, unethical links between big business and bureaucrats and whether an AIDS sufferer can be named in court.
Mr Takeshi will be tried for allegedly using blood products that had not been heat treated, knowing that the products could have been tainted with HIV.
