Featured news from NHIVNA
HIV-related news from NAM
Hormonal contraceptive use increases women’s risk of acquiring and transmitting HIV
Roger Pebody, 2011-07-21 12:00:00
A two-year, seven-country study has concluded that women using hormonal contraceptives, particularly injectable forms, are at a greater risk both of acquiring HIV themselves and of passing it on to a male sexual partner. Presenting the results to the International AIDS Society conference in Rome yesterday, Renee Heffron of the University of Washington said that strategies are needed to improve access to and uptake of lower-dose contraceptives and non-hormonal methods – such as IUDs, implants, patches or combination injectables.
The new study will be considered alongside the findings of a number of other studies that have also found an association between hormonal contraceptive use and HIV infection in women. However, this link has not been found consistently in all research. Most notably, a five-year study conducted with 6109 women in Zimbabwe, Uganda and Thailand found that neither the combined oral contraceptive pill nor DMPA (Depo-Provera) injections were associated with HIV infection.
The new findings are also notable for their investigation of the effect of contraceptive use on onward transmission to men – a previously unexplored area.
The data come from an analysis of 3790 serodiscordant couples (i.e. 7580 people) in South Africa, Botswana, Zambia, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda. In two-thirds of the couples, the female partner was HIV-positive, in one-third, the man.
The couples were recruited either as part of the Partners in Prevention cohort or for the Couples Observational Study (a study of immune correlates of HIV protection). Every three months, data were recorded on contraceptive use and sexual behaviour. HIV-negative partners were tested for HIV at the same frequency; only seroconversions that were determined by gene sequencing to have been acquired from the study partner were included in the analysis.
Most couples were married and had at least one child together, on average. At enrolment around a quarter of couples reported having unprotected sex in the last month. A quarter of couples experienced a pregnancy during the two-year study.
Source:1
