Pregnant women in the East Rand have embraced the Gauteng government’s offer of free nevirapine to prevent women with HIV from transmitting the virus to their babies.

Some 90 percent of the women attending antenatal clinics at Natalspruit Hospital and J Dumane clinic agreed to be tested for HIV once they understood that, if they tested positive, they and their babies would be given the anti-retroviral drug to reduce the chances of them passing the virus on to their babies.  

The pilot has been going for a month, and in its first three weeks over 500 women were tested at the two health centres. Over 30 percent of women at Natalspruit and almost 50 percent of women at J Dumane tested HIV positive.

“The response has been really good, which shows that there is a high demand,” said Dr Nomonde Xundu, medical adviser to Gauteng’s Public Health Directorate. “It has made all of us involved feel that at least we are doing something in the fight against HIV/AIDS.”

Xundu said nevirapine was just part of a comprehensive package being offered to pregnant women. Other key elements included assisting HIV negative women to remain so, and teaching HIV positive women to live healthily and to protect their babies. Midwives had also been taught to modify their obstetric procedures to reduce the risk of HIV transmission during labour.  

Natalspruit’s Sister Cynthia Mashiyi said that being part of the pilot, which offers had made her “very happy”.  

“It is so pathetic to see a young girl with her first child being confronted an HIV positive baby,” said Mashiyi. “At least this nevirapine offers some hope.”

Mashiyi added that many of the pregnant women coming to Natalspruit already knew about the drug offer, and she suspected some had changed their addresses to get access to the drug should they need it.  

“The only way to address this is to make it available all over otherwise if you have these little stands, people are going to rush to them,” added Mashiyi.

About 30 percent of HIV positive mothers transmit the virus to their babies, mostly during labour. Clinical trials have shown that nevirapine can cut the transmission rate by up to 40 percent.

Aside from nevirapine, Gauteng is offering free milk formula to mothers for six months as HIV can also be transmitted via breastfeeding. However, mothers who opt for formula have to have access to clean running water.  

Mothers are also given a broad spectrum antibiotic, Cotrimoxazole, to give to their babies from six weeks old to protect them from infections. Most HIV positive babies die before their fifth year, many succumbing to chest infections and pneumonia.

The HIV status of the “nevirapine babies” will only be known once they are 12 months old and no longer have their mothers’ antibodies.