Antiretroviral Drugs for Treating Pregnant Women and Preventing HIV Infection in Infants: Guidelines on Care, Treatment and Support for Women Living With HIV/AIDS and Their Children in Resource-Constrained Settings

This monograph presents guidelines for the use of antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) in pregnant women and for preventing perinatal transmission of HIV to their infants and summarizes programmatic considerations and scientific rationale behind the guidelines. The monograph includes recommendations for ARV treatment for pregnant women and women of childbearing age. It includes the safety of ARVs for pregnant women and their infants and a discussion of nucleoside analogue reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NRTI), non-nucleoside analogue reverse transcriptase inhibitors (NNRTI), and protease inhibitors (PI); resistance to ARVs following short-course prophylaxis for preventing mother to child transmission (MTCT); balancing risks and benefits in selecting the ARV regimen for preventing HIV in infants; safety and efficacy of ARVs for reducing HIV transmission during breastfeeding; and recommendations for the use of ARVs in pregnant women for their own health and to prevent HIV in their infants.