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Ask the Experts about Women and HIV

 

Having a Baby with Positive Male
Mar 14, 2006

Hi I am a 32 year old hiv negative female and my husband is hiv positve is it at all possible that our unborn child be hiv positive while i am still hiv negative

Response from Dr. Sullivan

A baby can only become infected with HIV if the mother is infected; transmission of HIV fom mother to baby can occur during pregnancy in the second or third trimester, during labor and delivery, and through breastmilk; if 100 HIV infected pregnant women delivered babies and breastfed them for two years without any treatment of the mother or baby, there would be approximately 35-40 infected babies; 5-7 babies would be infected during pregnancy, 15-20 babies would be infected during labor and delivery; and 10-15 babies would be infected during the breast feeding period; it will be very important for you to remain HIV negative throughout the pregnancy and during the breastfeeding period should you decide to breastfeed; women who become infected during pregnancy or during the breastfeeding period have a very high risk of transmitting virus to their babies because of the very high viral loads that occur during the period following infection; transmission of virus from mother to baby is related to viral load, a high viral load is associated with a high risk of transmission[ viral load greater than 100,000 copies/ml associated with 50% or greater risk of transmission], an undetectable viral load is associted with a very low risk of transmission[ viral load less than 1000 copies/ml associated with a less than 1% risk of transmission; JLS.



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