While pediatric HIV remains a growing concern throughout Southern Africa, Namibian doctors have managed to put high numbers of babies on the life-saving antiretroviral (ARV) treatment with the help of an early infant diagnosis (EID) program based on dry blood sampling.
Since the launch of the EID program in 2006, the number of HIV-infected newborns has dropped from 13 percent to two percent in Namibia, according to the national Ministry of Health.
These figures stand in sharp contrast with data from other African countries where many pregnant women are not diagnosed in time to prevent mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of the virus and only a few HIV-positive infants receive ARVs.
A 2009 study by the Centre of Infectious Disease Research in Zambia (CIDRZ) of HIV-positive mother-infant pairs in Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Zambia and South Africa, for instance, revealed that almost half of HIV-positive mothers who received ARVs to prevent the transmission of HIV to their unborn children did not complete the treatment. As a result, their babies were infected with virus.
Swaziland is another Southern African country where pediatric HIV remains a significant problem. "We have one of the ugliest HIV-situations in the world with a prevalence rate of 26.1 percent and one in every two pregnant women infected," explained Doctor Caspian Chouraya, medical officer at the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric Aids Foundation in Swaziland.
Since the launch of the early infant diagnosis program in Namibia, the number of HIV-infected newborns has dropped from 13 to two percent.