80% Malawi babies of HIV positive mothers are rsik free – Official
The country has registered strides in the Prevention of Mother to Child Transmission (PMTCT) with more than 80 percent HIV free babies born from HIV positive mothers.
Ministry of Health Spokesperson, Adrian Chikumbe said this in an interview.
“The country has become role model where other countries are now coming to learn best practice on how we are managing,” he said.
Malawi introduced the PMTCT in 2001 and adopted the Option B+ in 2012.
Jauliyat Ali, 33, and Loveness Malunga, 32, are both HIV positive but are raising HIV free babies, thanks to the Investing for Impact against HIV/AIDS/TB project being pioneered by YONECO at Malindi in Mangochi.
Malunga has been living with the virus for 11 years and her baby is 5 weeks old while Ali was diagnosed in 2016 and her baby is 7 months.
“I managed to give birth to an HIV negative baby because of the counseling I got from the support group as well as health service providers in the project. They encouraged me to adhere to drugs even during my pregnancy for me to have a healthy child,” she explained.
“Am forever grateful for giving birth to an HIV negative child and I will continue adhering to ART so that I provide no chance of infecting my baby,” added Ali.
Prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) programmes provide antiretroviral treatment (ART) to HIV-positive pregnant women to stop their infants from acquiring the virus.
Great work