Eight women test HIV positive after only discovering local womaniser had virus at his funeral

Italy: Eight young women have tested HIV positive - after discovering at the funeral of a local womaniser that he had been living with the virus.

The search for victims of 25-year-old Daniel Decu has now widened to Italy, after his mother admitted he had spent a year in the country apparently living a party lifestyle that left him sick when he returned to Romania. He died a year later.

The funeral of Daniel, which was attended by many of his lovers, turned into an angry shouting match when it was revealed he had been HIV positive.

It was also revealed that he'd had his first girlfriend at the age of 12, when his mother had given him a lecture on living with HIV and told him to make sure he always carried a condom with him.

He is said to have contracted the condition in a hospital as a young child.

Although he was registered as living with HIV, it only became known to the public when an autopsy was carried out and a coroner's report published.

Incredibly, it was also revealed that when a local doctor in the town of Segarcea, in south-eastern Romania's Dolj County, tried to warn people he had the disease, he was threatened with a lawsuit by the man's mother.

Doctor Cornel Stanciu, their family physician, knew that Daniel was HIV positive and tried to make his health condition public after the 24-year-old had a relationship with his daughter.

But when Daniel's mother Elena Secu, 45, found out what the doctor was doing, she had threatened to sue him unless it stopped.

The doctor said: "I knew he had a lot of female friends but there was nothing I could do about it."

The mother however says that all of the women that her son had relationships with knew that he had been suffering from HIV since he was little. She said: "They all knew, I don't know why they are saying these things now."

She added: "Dani went to the psychologist to prepare himself for living with the virus, and I told him he had to use protection, I was telling it to him from the age of 12. My boy had condoms in his pocket all the time."

And she said she welcomed the investigation ordered by prosecutors.

"I want this case to be resolved, and for my boy to rest in peace in his grave. He died because of tuberculosis, not from any complications as a result of suffering from the HIV virus."

However, critics of the mother pointed out that tuberculosis was often a consequence of having the HIV virus, with around 25 percent of deaths among HIV-positive people due to TB.

She also claimed that her son had been in good health despite living with the HIV virus, and had only started to get sick after deciding to move to Italy where he lived for a year.

She said that when he came back from Italy he seemed pale and sick and that a year after that he had died.

It was not known where he lived in Italy, or if he had continued his Romeo lifestyle there as well.

The eight people women who have now tested HIV positive will be added to two previously confirmed victims.

In total 40 women are known to have applied to take the test, although many more are suspected to have had the test done secretly in other counties.

Although it is impossible to take any action against the dead man, his mother and family are being investigated as well as others who knew about his condition, and said nothing.

AIDS remains the only disease specifically mentioned in a Romanian criminal law, where it says the transmission of the virus by a person who already knows he or she is infected can be punishable with a jail term of between five and 15 years.

Nicolae Popa, the mayor of Segarcea, said: "The boy's mother is to blame for the terrible situation that we now find ourselves in.

"It is only now that it has become clear that the family physician knew he was HIV positive and tried to make the situation public. When he started to do so he was threatened with a lawsuit by Daniel's mother."

But the young man's aunt Maria said: "Dani contacted the HIV virus at the Segarcea Hospital. At the time he was taken to hospital, several children were also infected.

"I know another three individuals that died, while others still live. My nephew is not guilty of anything.

"There are girls who had intimate relations with him, and the blood test came out negative so why is he to blame for those that are positive?"