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Imagine, just for a moment, that you're pregnant, or that someone you love is pregnant. Imagine that this is a happy thing -- the happiest thing -- and that you long to celebrate this pregnancy and the child that it will bring into the world.
Now imagine that you are -- or the person that you love is -- HIV positive.
If you live in the so-called developed world, being pregnant and HIV-positive doesn't mean that one's child will contract HIV. According to Avert.org, "in high income countries MTCT (mother-to-child-transmission) has been virtually eliminated thanks to effective voluntary testing and counseling, access to antiretroviral therapy, safe delivery practices, and the widespread availability and safe use of breast-milk substitutes." Virtually eliminated. Lives, saved. There will be all sorts of things for you to worry about for that baby -- but HIV doesn't dominate that list.
If, however, you do not live in "high income countries" -- if, for example, you live in sub-Saharan Africa -- you will not have the luxury, such as it is, of putting that worry in its place. As Avert.org also says, "without treatment, around 15-30% of babies born to HIV positive women will become infected with HIV during pregnancy and delivery. A further 5-20% will become infected through breastfeeding." If you live in the so-called less-developed world, you will likely not have access to treatment. You will face the risk of transmitting HIV to your baby. This is heartbreaking.
And it is so much more heartbreaking because it is preventable. MTCT is, as I noted above, almost entirely eliminated in high income countries. It does not need to happen. It can be prevented. No baby needs to contract HIV through transmission from her mother. And yet, they do, in countries where the maternal health services required to reduce the risk of MTCT are not in place. And these countries, of course, tend to be those where women are disproportionately affected by HIV. These are the countries where mothers and children are dying of AIDS. These are the countries -- these are the women, these are the children -- that we need to help.
The Global Fund is trying to do just that. Their Born HIV Free campaign aims to eradicate the incidence of MTCT by 2015. As Julie Marsh describes the mission at The Mom Slant:
Organizations like UNICEF and AVERT are working to offer services to African mothers in need. But the largest effort by far is led by the Global Fund – Born HIV Free ... the Global Fund is devoted to the eradication of AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria. It’s a “global public/private partnership dedicated to attracting and disbursing additional resources to prevent and treat these diseases ... Born HIV Free is a campaign by the Global Fund to mobilize public support for a world where no child is born with HIV by 2015.
Carla Bruni-Sarkozy puts it in more vivid terms:
Yeah. I know. It makes me cry, too.
I'm on record as insisting that we have an obligation to use our social media platform for good. We have loud, strong, passionate voices. Voices that get heard. We can -- we should -- raise our voices in support of this cause. Because all that's needed right now is our voices. Nobody needs to put on a tutu or run a marathon or find something to donate to an auction or place
