HIV prevention in women

Today, it is feasible to prevent getting an HIV contamination or passing the virus to your partner or baby. But girls nevertheless face unique challenges in preventing HIV.

• What particular challenges do girls face in preventing HIV?
• How can I prevent HIV?
• Can I take medicine to save you getting or passing HIV?
• What are some behaviors that can boost a female’s threat for HIV?
• How can I prevent HIV if I inject capsules?
• How can I save you HIV if I get tattoos or frame piercings?
• I’m pregnant and feature HIV. Will my infant get HIV?

What particular challenges do girls face in preventing HIV?

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, some prevention demanding situations are unique to ladies:

• Women can pass HIV to their infants all through being pregnant and birth and thru breastfeeding.
• A girl’s anatomy makes it less complicated to get HIV through sex compared with a man’s anatomy.
• Having a sexually transmitted infection (STI) increases a lady’s chance for HIV extra than a man’s.
• Women are more likely to lack manipulate in relationships and fear violence, stigma, or abandonment whilst trying to prevent HIV exposure.
• Women are much more likely to be victims of sexual abuse. People with a history of sexual abuse are much more likely to engage in high-threat sexual behaviors like exchanging sex for pills, having multiple partners, or having sex with a associate who is physically abusive while asked to apply a condom.

How can I prevent HIV?

The excellent way to prevent HIV is to no longer have vaginal, oral, or anal sex or proportion needles at any time. Sharing needles for any motive is very volatile.

If you do have sex, lower your hazard of getting an STI with the following steps:

• Use condoms. Male latex condoms are the handiest manner to save you HIV and different STIs if you have intercourse. Because a person does not want to ejaculate (come) to offer or get some STIs, make sure to place the condom on earlier than the penis touches the vagina, mouth, or anus. Female condoms can also assist to prevent HIV infection. Other strategies of beginning control, like start manage pills, shots, implants, or diaphragms, will no longer shield you from STIs.
• Get tested. Be sure you and your partner are tested for HIV and different STIs. Talk to every different approximately the check results before you have sex. Having an STI increases your chances of turning into inflamed with HIV at some point of sex. If your companion has an STI in addition to HIV, that additionally will increase your threat of HIV infection. If you have an STI, you need to additionally get examined for HIV.
• Be monogamous. Having sex with just one accomplice can lower your threat for HIV and different STIs. After being examined for STIs, be faithful to every other. That means which you have sex handiest with every other and no person else.
• Limit your quantity of sexual partners. Your threat of having HIV and other STIs goes up with the quantity of partners you’ve got.
• Get vaccinated. You can get a vaccine to shield towards HPV and hepatitis B, which are STIs. There is no vaccine to save you or treat HIV.
• Don’t douche. Douching removes a number of the regular bacteria in the vagina that protects you from infection. This may additionally growth your danger of getting HIV and different STIs.
• Do now not abuse alcohol or tablets. Alcohol or drug abuse can also lead to volatile behaviors consisting of sharing needles to inject drugs or no longer using a condom when you have sex.

The steps work pleasant when used together. No unmarried step can shield you from each single sort of STI.

Learn extra approximately your chance for HIV with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s HIV Risk Reduction Tool.

Male latex condoms are a quite effective way to prevent HIV and different STIs, however almost one in each five women who uses handiest condoms for start control receives pregnant.three The nice way to save you both STIs and being pregnant is to use a latex condom together with some other pretty effective method of delivery manipulate together with an intrauterine device (IUD), an implant, or the shot.

Can I take medicine to save you getting or passing HIV?

Yes. Several drugs are available to assist lower your hazard of having or passing HIV:

Pre-publicity prophylaxis (PrEP)

PrEP is an HIV prevention method for folks who do now not have HIV infection but who may be at high chance. PrEP is a pill you are taking by using mouth each day.

Talk for your health practitioner about PrEP if:

• You are HIV-negative however your companion is HIV-high quality (called serodiscordant or mixed-popularity couples)
• You aren’t in a monogamous relationship (you or your companion also have intercourse with different people) and you do not usually use condoms
• You inject unlawful drugs or percentage needles
• You have a partner who’s HIV-wonderful, and you want to get pregnant. PrEP might also assist protect you and your child.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that PrEP could prevent transmission in as many as 140,000 serodiscordant heterosexual couples.four Learn extra about PrEP.

Post-publicity prophylaxis (PEP)

PEP is an anti-HIV medication for individuals who may were very recently exposed to HIV.5 If you think you’ve got been uncovered (for example, if a condom breaks), or in case you were sexually assaulted, speak on your doctor or nurse about taking PEP.

You need to take PEP within three days of publicity to assist decrease your hazard for HIV. You then take two to 3 antiretroviral drugs for 28 days to save you the virus from copying itself and spreading via your frame.

While taking PEP, you still want to take steps to save you HIV, together with using a condom with sex partners. Learn extra about PEP.

Antiretroviral drugs

If you’re HIV-wonderful, taking antiretroviral (ARV) remedy can reduce your viral load (the amount of HIV to your blood) to hold you healthy. Knowing your viral load measurement and a way to manipulate it with the aid of lowering it to undetectable tiers can protect your unborn baby for the duration of pregnancy, exertions, and delivery. It also can help save you spreading HIV to your sexual accomplice.

What are some behaviors that can boost a female’s threat for HIV?

Behaviors that improve a female’s risk for HIV include:

• Having sex with a male companion who has had intercourse with any other man or who has used intravenous (IV) tablets. Sex with a man is the most common way ladies are infected with HIV.
• Using injection pills and sharing needles. This is the second most common way that HIV is spread.
• Abusing pills and alcohol. This can lead to volatile behavior, such as having sex with out a condom, no longer understanding a accomplice’s HIV reputation, or injecting drugs.

Women who drink alcohol or use capsules will also be at better chance of sexual assault or rape, which may additionally positioned you at threat for HIV. If you are assaulted or raped, you want to look a medical doctor proper away. Your health practitioner may additionally determine which you ought to get post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP). These drugs may additionally lower your chances of getting HIV after you have been uncovered to the virus. But these drugs work best in case you see a medical doctor within 3 days of publicity.

How can I prevent HIV if I inject capsules?

Intravenous (IV) drug customers who share needles are at high risk for HIV. Sharing needles can vicinity another person’s blood proper into your body, even if the amount is so small that you can not see it at the needle.

People who inject steroids, insulin, or drug treatments for other fitness troubles are at danger for HIV if they do not use sterilized needles each time. Whenever you want to apply a needle, make sure that it is sterilized. Do now not percentage needles with anyone. You also can get HIV if the device used for frame piercings and tattoos isn’t sterilized.

If you inject pills or drug treatments, observe these steps to decrease your risk of getting HIV:

• Never reuse or “proportion” needles, syringes, water, or drug preparation equipment.
• Only use needles and syringes that you got from a reliable source (consisting of drugstores or needle alternate programs).
• Use a new, sterile needle or syringe every time.
• If you ought to use a needle utilized by others, clean it with bleach before the usage of it.
• If possible, use sterile water to put together pills; otherwise, use clean water from a dependable source (together with clean tap water).
• Use a new or disinfected container (“cooker”) and a new filter (“cotton”) to prepare capsules.
• Clean the injection site with a brand new alcohol swab previous to injection.
• Throw away needles and syringes after one use. Do not throw them inside the normal trash. You can use an vintage laundry detergent or milk jug to collect used needles and syringes and then seal the container before casting off it. Check with your local fitness branch about the correct manner to throw away the container.
• Don’t percentage needles or syringes with pals or family.

How can I save you HIV if I get tattoos or frame piercings?

Follow these steps to lower your hazard of getting HIV:

• Ask questions on how the personnel sterilizes their equipment. Single-use contraptions that reduce the skin need to be used as soon as and then thrown away. Reusable units that cut the skin have to be wiped clean and sterilized between makes use of.
• Find out what steps the team of workers takes to save you HIV and different infections, like hepatitis B and hepatitis C.
• Make certain your tattoo parlor follows state guidelines and health inspections.

I’m pregnant and feature HIV. Will my infant get HIV?

If you are getting treatment for HIV, the solution is maximum likely no. When HIV medication is used continuously and correctly, a pregnant woman residing with HIV who is treated for HIV early in her being pregnant can decrease the danger of turning in a baby with HIV to much less than 1%. Without remedy, this chance is set 25% within the United States.6

All women need to be examined for HIV throughout their first prenatal care visit, early in the being pregnant. High-hazard ladies who get a poor HIV test result must be tested again later in pregnancy.

Treatment, referred to as antiretroviral therapy, works best when it’s far:

• Started as early as viable in pregnancy
• Also given throughout exertions and delivery
• Given to the little one after start

If you’re HIV-positive and your viral load is extra than 1,000 copies in line with milliliter, your physician may additionally recommend delivering your baby via cesarean (C-section).

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