The new rule allows HIV-infected organ transplants – and is expected to reduce waiting times for everyone

HIV-positive people who need a kidney or liver transplant will be able to receive an organ from an HIV-positive donor under new rules announced Tuesday by U.S. health officials.

Previously, such transplants could only be performed as part of scientific research. The new rule, which goes into effect on Wednesday, is expected to reduce waiting times for organs for everyone, regardless of HIV status, by increasing the pool of available organs.

“This rule removes unnecessary barriers to kidney and liver transplantation, expanding the organ donor pool and improving outcomes for HIV-infected transplant recipients,” Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra said in a statement.

The practice’s safety is supported by research, including one published last month in the New England Journal of Medicine.

This study followed 198 organ transplant recipients for up to four years, comparing people who received kidneys from HIV-infected donors with those whose kidneys came from HIV-uninfected donors.

Both groups had similarly high rates of overall survival and low rates of organ rejection.

In 2010, surgeons in South Africa provided the first evidence that harvesting organs from HIV-positive donors is safe in HIV-infected people.

However, the practice was not allowed in the United States until 2013, when the government lifted the ban and allowed scientific research.

Initially, the research focused on deceased donors. Then in 2019, the team at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore performed the world’s first kidney transplant from a living donor infected with HIV to an HIV-infected recipient.

A total of 500 kidney and liver transplants were performed from HIV-infected donors in the United States.