HUNDREDS of people who showed symptoms of HIV at two Birmingham hospitals were allowed to go home without being tested.

In just three months, 321 patients who doctors fear might have the Aids virus were not given a test. It means these people could be carriers of the deadly virus.

Figures revealed in a conference in New York on Friday showed that just 40 patients at the two hospitals were offered the test.

It is claimed that some doctors are reluctant to offer testing to patients because it sometimes involves complications including counselling and insurance effects.

An estimated 73,000 adults are now living with HIV in the UK, yet up to a third are believed to be unaware of their condition.

But health experts believe the agures could be even higher, caused by an increase in people having unprotected sex and an influx of immigrants from countries where Aids is more prevalent.

A three-month survey carried out at Heartlands Hospital and University Hospital Birmingham identiaed 361 patients who were being treated for a speciac set of conditions more prevalent in HIV sufferers. The conditions included hepatitis, tuberculosis and pyrexia - fever of an unknown cause.

But only 40 of them - 19 men and 21 women - were tested for HIV.

It is not known how many actually tested positive.

But a massive majority, 281 patients, were discharged without being offered a test or warned they might have been at risk.

There is no legal or contractual requirement on hospital doctors or GPs to offer the test. But in America all accident and emergency admissions are automatically tested unless they opt out.

But last year, an open letter from Chief Medical Ofacer, Sir Liam Donaldson, called upon members of the health profession to do much more to persuade their patients to seek testing.

Dr Steve Taylor, lead consultant for HIV services at Heartlands Hospital in Birmingham, said: "This is an infection that anybody who is having unprotected sex can get.

"We need to encourage people to look after their sexual health, to use condoms and get themselves tested for sexually transmitted diseases.

"On a professional level, doctors from all specialities, GP and hospital doctors, need to encourage and promote widespread testing."

The West Midlands Regional HIV Surveillance project say 4,018 adults and children in the region have been diagnosed HIV-positive.

But the group believes a further 2,000 are unaware of their condition because they are not offered testing.

Figures published by the Health Protection Agency in December showed a 22 per cent rise in the diagnosis of patients in the West Midlands from 446 in 2005 to 544 in 2006, despite a national decline of seven per cent.

Among children, the agure has spiralled from less than ten in 2000 to a new child being diagnosed on average every two weeks.

Meanwhile, in the last 12 months alone four pregnant women aged 18-20 in Birmingham tested positive for HIV. The young victims - three white and one Afro-Carribbean - all contracted the virus through heterosexual unprotected sex. Appropriate treatment meant they are all well and their babies were born uninfected.

jeanetteoldham@mrn.co.uk