HIV + WOMEN STILL WANT CHILDREN

Post Courier 29 July 2011

The Pacific Islands AIDS Foundation reports a study of women living with HIV who still want to have children. This was from a study of Fijian and Papua New Guinea.

It was reported that women are still confused about whether or not they could have an HIV negative child.

Many had given birth to HIV+ children who had been infected and died. Mothers were often the care giver of HIV+ husbands.

Gossip and physical isolation were among discriminatory practices that affected Pacific women. Women tend to be blamed and viewed as the source of infection.

Comment:

HIV infected babies.  There was a time when women had to give birth and put the infection of the baby into the hands of fate. We remember being advised that a woman with low viral count may give birth to a HIV negative baby.

But that has all changed. It is no longer left to fate. The mother takes ARV early in the pregnancy. Check with your doctor.

The viral count in the blood stream drops to zero if the treatment succeeds. This means that the baby at birth will not be infected in blood mixing with mother’s blood.

If there is zero count in the blood of the mother, there will be zero count in the milk. The mother need not feel worry about infecting her baby with the virus in breast milk.

Isolation of wife:  AIDS Holistics has routinely warned women to take care about where they will live after marriage. If their village is on the Papuan coast and they live with a husband in Kerowagi, they will be in big trouble during marriage difficulties.

If the man is found to be HIV positive and he blames the wife, his family will support him not the wife from the coast of Papua. She was the one who infected their family member. Let him bash her. What if she was raped by her brother-in-law and she is afraid to speak out?

A woman has to be careful about marrying a man from far away. It would be best if she could travel by PMV for 2 hours back to her village when she runs away from her violent husband.

If she leaves on a PMV down the highway, she can be easily stopped by her husband’s wantoks with the aid of a mobile phone. Stop so-and-so PMV and take my wife and child off.