A major focus of this year's International Aids Conference in Mexico City was the ongoing effort to protect and care for girls and women with HIV-aids
People often think HIV is spread by risky sexual behaviors, or intravenous drug use.
But another major concern is infected mothers passing the virus on to their unborn child.
One in four infants who have HIV positive mothers are infected with HIV.
But local research at BC Women's Hospital in Vancouver suggests that this doesn't have to be the case.
The study's findings are as follows:
Those who were treated with drug therapy transmitted the virus to their babies only 1.2% per the time.
Those who received some drug therapy - 3.4%
Those who had no drug therapy passed the virus onto their newborns 21.4% of the time.
In B.C., 211 HIV-positive women treated before delivery since 1997 had no transmission to their babies. But seven B.C. babies were infected during this time due to their mother's lack of knowledge of their HIV status or lack of access to care
Local transmission rates are currently 1%.
"With all of the women who have been able to access care since 1997, we have had zero transmissions, so that's in about 200 women in B.C.,'' said Dr. Deborah Money of the Women's Health Research Institute
"Multi-drug anti-HIV therapy during pregnancy will decrease the risk of transmission of HIV from mother to infant to one to two per cent," Dr. Money said.
The following information and quotes relate to the study currently underway at BC Women's Hospital & Health Centre's Oak Tree Clinic. The principal investigator of this study is Helene Cote.
Dr. Money is the investigative lead for pregnancy for the study. It aims to decrease this transmission rate to less than per cent.
This study is looking at specific toxicities and at how we can choose the least toxic combination to prevent mother-child transmission.
The drugs work by suppressing the amount of the virus in the mom's bloodstream to very low levels.
"If we can achieve that before birth that seems to be the most important factor to limit or almost eliminate the transmission to the baby," said Dr. Money.
It's convincing evidence for all pregnant women to be tested for HIV, so they may receive the best care possible to achieve a healthy pregnancy and deliver babies who are HIV free.
The Oak Tree Clinic at B.C. Women's hospital provides state-of-the-art care and research for women and their children living with HIV.
These antiretroviral medications used during pregnancy are powerful and one important project is to provide ongoing support and follow-up to look for any long term effects of the drugs on uninfected newborns as they grow older.
Ongoing research is still needed to evaluate the least toxic combination of HIV drugs to use in pregnancy.
With a report by CTV British Columbia's Dr. Rhonda Low
