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HIV Positive Women
On this page, you will find:
- Microbicides could benefit women living with HIV
- Microbicides could benefit the partners and families of HIV-positive women
- All candidate microbicides must be safe for HIV-positive women
HIV-positive women are some of the most vocal advocates for microbicides. By protecting health and promoting healthy sexuality, microbicides would offer an important and welcome tool in positive women's lives. Women living with HIV face the challenges of the epidemic daily, and offer a unique perspective on the broad impact microbicides could have in their lives.
Microbicides could benefit women living with HIV
Microbicides could help protect against HIV and possibly other infections that pose serious problems, especially when one's immune system is weakened. A broad-acting microbicide against multiple STIs would help prevent these dangerous infections in HIV-positive women, and may even promote healthy vaginal conditions to ward off yeast infections or bacterial vaginosis.
Microbicides could benefit the partners and families of HIV-positive women
Microbicides are likely to protect both partners, giving HIV-positive women another option for helping protect their partners who may not use condoms. Some microbicides may be contraceptive and others may not. This will give positive women who want to have children the ability to do so with less risk to an HIV-negative partner. Contraceptive microbicides would give women another way to avoid an unwanted pregnancy.
As the science and research of microbicides advance, it may be possible to formulate a microbicide as a vaginal wash to help prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV during childbirth, as an addition or back-up to anti-retroviral interventions. Microbicide researchers are also investigating a compound that could be added to breast milk to make it safe for infant feeding.
All candidate microbicides must be safe for HIV-positive women
Women living with HIV may have different needs for and responses to various microbicide products. We must understand these factors before microbicides become widely available, both because positive women will be using them, and because some women may not know their status before using a microbicide. Several potential microbicides are undergoing specialized trials in order to prove they are safe for positive women to use. These preliminary safety trials must be followed by trials that generate long-term use data among women living with HIV so that researchers can adequately access the long-term safety if such products if used by HIV positive women.
For more detailed information visit our 'Download Materials' and check out FS7 - HIV Positive Women and Microbicides in one of the different languages US English - English - Spanish - French - Russian
