AIDS: Changed Drug Treatment Could Protect Newborn Babies

United Nations, New York, 22 July 2009 – Office of the Spokesperson for the Secretary-General. Mother-to-child HIV transmission rates can be dramatically cut with the administration of a cocktail of antiretroviral (ARV) drugs over a longer period of time to pregnant and breastfeeding women, the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) announced today. Newborn babies are over 40 per cent less likely to become infected with the virus if HIV-positive pregnant women take a combination of three ARV drugs from the last trimester of pregnancy until six months into breastfeeding, rather than a short course of drugs that ends at delivery, according to a new study led by the World Health Organization (WHO). The study named Kesho Bora, which means a better future in Swahili involved 1140 women from Burkina Faso, Kenya and South Africa and showed that a significant reduction can be achieved in many pregnant women with a lowered immune cell count.
Video Rating: 4 / 5