WUNRN
UN News Centre
22 July 2009 – 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
1,140 women from
In
many developing countries HIV-positive mothers face a tough choice between
breastfeeding their babies and risking the transmission of the virus through
their milk, or giving them formula which deprives infants of the natural
immunity passed on through breast milk and helps protect against diarrhoea,
malnutrition and other potentially deadly diseases.
UNAIDS
said in a news release
that it was clear that the Kesho Bora research increases the range of treatment
options available to mothers living with the virus and offers them hope that,
if they so wish, they have a greater chance of breastfeeding their babies
without passing on HIV.
The
agency added that there is no increased risk to the health of the mother or the
infant associated with this triple-ARV regimen, consisting of zidovudine,
lamivudine and lopinavir/ritonavir.
“Strengthened
services for maternal health, for reproductive health and for paediatric health
will mean we can prevent mothers from dying and babies from becoming infected
with HIV in Lesotho and around the world,” said UNAIDS Executive Director
Michel Sidibé during a recent visit to Lesotho in Southern Africa.
The
initial findings of the three-year study were presented at the 5th
International AIDS Society Conference on HIV Pathogenesis, Treatment and
Prevention, which concluded today in
WHO
worked on the study in partnership with the French National Agency for Research
on AIDS and Viral Hepatitis (ANRS), the US Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC) and Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health
and Human Development (NICHD) of the US National Institutes of Health.
Additional
funds for the Kesho Bora study were provided by the European and Developing
Countries Clinical Trials Partnership, the Thrasher Foundation, the UK
Department for International Development, UNICEF
and the Belgian Government.
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