A new study finds that women infected with HIV who fed their babies with only breast milk for more than the first four months of the child's life had the least risk of giving the virus to the children through breast milk.
In conducting their test, the researchers from Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health tracked more than 900 Zambian women who were infected with HIV, along with their babies, over the course of two years. After four months of breastfeeding, half of the women were asked to stop, while the other half were asked to continue. Breast milk was collected from the women after four and a half months, while the babies were tested for HIV throughout the process.
The results indicated that the highest HIV concentrations were found in the breast milk of women who discontinued breastfeeding after four months. While 77 percent of women who stopped breastfeeding had traceable HIV concentrations in their breast milk, only 39.5 percent of those who breastfed exclusively had such concentrations. No difference was detected two weeks earlier, at the four-month mark.
According to the researchers, the results have important implications for the effect of even small changes in breastfeeding behavior on mother-to-child HIV transmission.
"Our results have profound implications for prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission programs in settings where breastfeeding is necessary to protect infant and maternal health," Mailman School professor of epidemiology Louise Kuhn wrote. "Our data demonstrate that early and abrupt weaning carries significant risks for infants."
Breastfeeding is widely considered the strongest nutritional option for newborns because of its delivery of both essential nutrients and immune-system factors that help shield the baby from life-threatening infections. However, breastfeeding involving HIV-infected mothers has been controversial, given that the virus can be transmitted through breast milk.
An article on lowering the risk of HIV transmission through breastfeeding is published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
