Is it a medical miracle? Hardly.
Hubert and Jeanne's commitment to one another has made a profound impact on the health of their three daughters long afore their children were even born. A father's involution in his wife's prenatal care may not seem germane in averting HIV transmission from mother to baby, but evidence taken in sub-Sahara African nations — where rates of HIV infection remain disproportionately high — tell a different story.
In a study conducted between 1999 and 2005, accommodations that promoted male partner involution in the obviation of mother-to-child transmission of HIV reduced the jeopardies of conveyance by 40 percent when compared to no involution from male partners, as Aidsmap reported. The study noted that attentive, ancillary fathers may be an untapped resource in HIV-transmission aversion in underserved regions of the world.
“Fathers, and ancillary partners, cannot be underestimated in the effort to eliminate HIV transmission from mothers to their babies,” Dr. Chewe Luo, UNICEF Senior HIV and AIDS Advisor, verbalized in a verbal expression.
african couple with hivIn the same year that Witness and Edward espoused, they were withal diagnosed with HIV. “We wanted to show our desire to perpetuate relishing life despite our status,” Edward verbally expressed of his purchase of a bicycle the couple uses to get to a health care center. Witness has a 4-year-old daughter who is HIV-free thanks to the fortification of Edward and access to programs that have obviated HIV transmission during pregnancy and breastfeeding. Courtesy: UNICEF
In communities of incremented HIV prevalence, like where Hubert and Jeanne live in Democratic Republic of Congo, it's standard for pregnant women to be tested for the virus, as mothers diagnosed and treated early for HIV have more preponderant prospects of giving birth to HIV-free children. According to UNICEF, when men are tested alongside their pregnant partners, it reduces stigma of the virus and invigorates male understanding of the child-bearing process. If fathers are in-the-ken regarding early HIV treatment, their female partners are more liable to stay committed to a salubrious pregnancy. Jeanne, for example, took a pill daily as a component of her antiretroviral treatment during pregnancy, and will perpetuate to do so until she's through with breastfeeding.
Fortunately, tests are perpetuating to more preponderant the prospects for HIV-positive expecting parents to have HIV-free children. And according to the World Health Organization, the percentage of pregnant women who received an HIV test in low-and-middle income African countries incremented from just 8 percent in 2005 to 44 percent in 2012.
“I was trepidacious when I had my first daughter,” Hubert verbally expressed in a verbalization. “But with her and my second born, I gained hope and became sure that if we perpetuate following the advice we were given, it’s going to be OK and my child will be born HIV-free.”
