New test to detect HIV in babies boosts hope of meeting UN targets

This was originally published on Global Health TV on October 25, 2016.

When Saquina, a 38-year-old single mother living in Nacala Porto, Mozambique, learned she was HIV positive while pregnant, she thought her life was over. Instead, she decided to accept her HIV status and follow the advice of the nurse who counseled her.

She did not miss any visits to the health center. She took the pills that helped prevent transmission of the virus to her unborn child. She participated in support groups with other HIV-positive mothers. When her son Frenchou was born, she gave him medication every day and breastfed him exclusively for six months.

When he was two years old, Frenchou was tested for HIV and found negative — another of many recent successes in the prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT), according to the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation.

Between 2009 and 2015, there was a 60% decline in new HIV infections in children in the 21 priority countries, according to a UNAIDS report released in June. Seven of those countries reduced infections by more than 70%. A total of 1.2 million new infections among children were averted in these countries.

But if you thought thought that all is now well with PMTCT, and that we can move on to other HIV challenges, you would be mistaken. While a 60% drop is certainly encouraging, it is significantly below the 90% target set by the World Health Organization (WHO). UNAIDS has set a goal of eliminating all new HIV infections among children by 2020 while ensuring that 1.6 million children have access to HIV treatment by 2018.

Using sexiness to stop unsafe sex

Sexy condom ads like this helped DKT increase condom sales in Brazil.

This article was published originally by Fast Company's Co.EXIST blog on October 5, 2012.

Sex and sexuality have long been used to market a variety of consumer products in wealthy countries. But when it comes to HIV prevention and family planning in developing countries, global health practitioners have mostly shied away from using the titillating strategies so effective in the commercial world.

The Pleasure Project and a small group of like-minded nonprofit partners are trying to change that, by shaking up an international reproductive health community that tries to promote safer sexual behavior by influencing the most intimate aspects of the lives of people in developing countries. With their motto, “Putting the sexy back into safer sex,” the Pleasure Project is spreading that message far and wide. At the XIX International AIDS Conference in Washington, D.C., this summer, they held a session entitled “Pleasure at AIDS 2012: Everything You Wanted to Know About Pleasurable Safer Sex but Were Afraid to Ask” that explored whether pleasure and eroticism can be harnessed to enhance HIV prevention. The conclusion was that they can indeed, even though most campaigns don’t even try.