The Health Ministry is investigating suspicions that a gynecologist from Ichilov Hospital in Tel Aviv infected one of his patients with hepatitis C while performing a cesarean section on her in 2005.

Ichilov, a government-municipal hospital, said on Tuesday that in the wake of the suspicions, the doctor in question has stopped operating in the hospital.

According to information given to the patient's family, the doctor is a hepatitis C carrier, but the lab test that can ascertain whether the viruses carried by the doctor and the patient have the same genetic makeup has yet to be done.

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The test is slated to be carried out within the next few days, and only afterward will it be clear whether the surgeon was the one who infected the woman.

Tests carried out at Ichilov show that she did not have hepatitis C while she was pregnant or during the C-section.

She was found to be carrying the disease a few weeks after giving birth; most of the time, the virus can only be detected in the blood a few weeks after infection.

The baby born after the C-section is healthy, but his mother now requires weekly shots, which can have side effects such as depression, hair loss and thyroid problems.

In addition, some 20 percent of hepatitis C patients suffer serious liver damage, a top doctor said. He said it was important to detect the disease early in order to treat it most efficiently and prevent others from being infected.

The suspicion that the gynecologist had infected his patient was first raised on September 17 before Ichilov director Prof. Gabi Barabash and Prof. Yosef Lessing, who heads its gynecology and maternity ward.

On that date, the attorney representing the patient - Doron Caspi, from the medical negligence firm Caspi Sror - asked the two Ichilov officials to act immediately, "in light of the supreme public importance of an urgent clarification to prevent additional instances of infection."

But it was only on Tuesday, after Haaretz requested information on the case, that Ichilov Hospital informed the estimated 50 women who had been treated by the doctor since December 2005 about the possibility of infection.

The hospital said the women had been offered the choice of getting examined immediately, or of waiting until Ichilov tells them the results of the pending lab tests.

The doctor in question began working at Ichilov last December, after spending about seven years as a gynecology intern at Sheba Medical Center, Tel Hashomer.

He also works for the Maccabi health maintenance organization.

The Health Ministry said on Tuesday that the chance of a woman being infected by the physician operating on her, if the doctor carries the virus, "is very small to negligible."

Ichilov said: "The type of virus the doctor carries is not transmitted through regular contact, but only through the transmission of blood or bodily fluids, and so the chance of infection during surgery, when the team is protected by gloves, is small."

Nonetheless, several articles published in medical journals over the last few years describe dozens of such incidents around the world.

The transmission of the hepatitis C virus takes place when the carrier's blood - for instance, through an open cut on his hand after the surgical glove tears - comes into contact with the patient's body.

According to these articles, hepatitis C is the most prevalent of the viral infections that medical teams transmit to their patients.

Caspi asked the Health Ministry and the deputy director of Ichilov Hospital on Monday to "act immediately" to locate the women who have been treated by the doctor.