Recent Posts
- Illinois Attorney General Files Lawsuit Against HIV/AIDS Nonprofit
- California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger Signs Budget That Cuts $52M From HIV/AIDS Programs
- Efforts Underway In Namibia To Treat Pediatric HIV
- HIV/AIDS Education Project Targeting Pennsylvania Black Women Examined
- Also In Global Health News: Uganda Male Circumcision; Malaria Vaccine; Potential Global Fund Grant In Cambodia; PMTCT Of HIV In Botswana
Random Posts
- Also In Global Health News: USAID Administrator; HIV Infection Rate In Zimbabwe; Plumpy'Nut In India
- Only Drop-In Needle Exchange Center In Minnesota Closes Due To Lack Of Funding
- Newly Nominated Surgeon General Will Need To Talk More Openly About HIV/AIDS, Opinion Piece Says
- Terrence Higgins Trust Brings Chlamydia Testing To The Streets Of Shropshire, UK
- African Health Ministers Adopt Resolutions To Improve Health As WHO Regional Meeting Closes
- Two Leading Research Institutions Partner To Accelerate The Development Of An AIDS Vaccine Candidate
- Australia Harm Reduction Strategies Serve As Model For Other Countries, UNAIDS Official Says
- Recent Releases On Global Health
- Global Fund Faces $3B Funding Shortfall
- Scientists Receive Grant To Develop Hand-Held Self-Monitoring Test For HIV Viral Loads
Prescription AIDS Drugs
Contact Us
Many Pregnant Women Avoid HIV Screening In Africa
March 29th, 2010
‘Prevention is the best cure’ is a common expression, but what happens if preventative measures are not used? A large proportion of pregnant Ugandan women are going out of their way not to be HIV tested, increasing the risk of mother-to-child transmission.
A recent paper by Larsson et al. in AIDS journal discussed how mother-to-child transmission of HIV can be easily and cost-effectively prevented using a short course of antiretroviral therapy. However, this is effective only if the mother is willing to be screened for HIV.
Anne Buve, a member of Faculty of 1000 Medicine, discusses the recent and “worrying” findings of this study, which she describes as “quite sobering”. There is currently an opt-out policy for HIV testing even though the HIV prevalence in Uganda is 6.4%.
One year after the implementation of the opt-out policy, fewer than 60% of pregnant women were tested for HIV in 2007 in the majority of countries in Eastern and Southern Africa, the exception being Botswana where voluntary counseling and subsequent testing rates are higher.
Programmes of syphilis screening during pregnancy already faced the same problem in Uganda. However, the authors of the study suggest that women who attended an antenatal clinic that did not have HIV testing on site, did so in order to avoid HIV testing. If confirmed, this finding is worrying.
More studies that identify and tackle the problems that exist with HIV screening need to be carried out, especially in parts of the world that have a high prevalence of HIV. Dr Buve goes on to say, “there should be more studies like this one that look into why people do not have access to or refuse to accept interventions that could prevent HIV infection among their offspring”.
Source: Steve Pogonowski
Faculty of 1000: Biology and Medicine
Related posts:
- WHO Reviews Antiretroviral Recommendations For Pregnant, Breastfeeding Women With HIV The World Health Organization is reviewing its 2006 guidelines on...
- South Africa Announces Policy To Provide Antiretroviral Drugs To HIV-Positive Pregnant Women, Children In a World AIDS Day speech on Tuesday, South African...
- Use Of Antiretrovirals Increases Among African Pregnant Women, Children With HIV/AIDS, U.N. Report Says The number of HIV-positive pregnant women taking antiretroviral drugs to...
- 50 Million Women In Asia At Risk Of HIV From Their Intimate Partners An estimated 50 million women in Asia are at risk...
- Video Game To Help Urban Teens Avoid HIV Infection Focus Of Nearly $4 Million Grant To Yale Creating a video game to help teens avoid sex, drugs...
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
No Comments »
No comments yet.
RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL
Leave a comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.