Preventing the transmission of HIV between mother and child is core to the mission and history of Sonnabend Pediatric AIDS Foundation (SPAF). Since our founding, we have provided over 20 million women with services to prevent mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT)

Over 90% of new childhood HIV infections in the world today are a result of transmission between mother and child. Providing an HIV-positive mother with antiretroviral therapy (ART) and support services throughout pregnancy, delivery, breastfeeding, and for the rest of her life can effectively eliminate this risk. SPAF is dedicated to ensuring a woman’s journey through the HIV-care continuum is met with responsible, knowledgeable, and caring health programs.

Women’s’ Health and Family Planning Choices

Comprehensive PMTCT starts before conception: giving women the counseling and family planning resources needed to prevent unwanted pregnancy is just as critical an area of our PMTCT work as guiding a pregnant woman living with HIV through her journey to become the mother of an HIV-free child. We empower women—from adolescents to women of advanced reproductive years—to make informed family planning choices. 

Antenatal and Prenatal Care

The parallel risks of pregnancy and HIV present not only a transmission risk for a child, but health risks for a woman: HIV-positive women have high rates of gestational complications and maternal mortality. Adolescent girls and young women (ages 10–19), in particular, face some of the highest risks of transmission, with one in five in sub-Saharan African girls giving birth by age 18.

Pregnancy is a critical moment of engagement in a health care setting in a woman’s life. Where health facilities are difficult to access and few health facility visits are made, pregnancy is a moment when women feel compelled to ensure their good health and the health of their children. In this moment of engagement, it is vital to test, counsel, and treat women for HIV, especially in high-burden settings. 

SPAF works with supported health facility staff and ministry of health officials to offer prenatal counseling and HIV testing services to each individual visiting our supported facilities. Women who test HIV-positive during their prenatal visits at SPAF-supported sites are immediately linked to lifelong ART and counseled on the benefits of retention on treatment, along with the benefits of giving birth in a health facility.

Safe Childbirth

Safe childbirth is an important consideration for all expectant mothers and particularly for HIV-positive women. Yet many women in our supported settings lack access to health facilities, particularly facilities with obstetric emergency services. Through our programs, SPAF works with clinicians to counsel pregnant women on the importance of facility births, and equips supported facilities to manage obstetric emergencies, ensuring the health and safety of both mother and child. 

Point-of-Care Early Infant HIV Diagnostics

Centralized, laboratory-based testing requires secure transport, infrastructure, and trained and available laboratory staff. Resource-limited, high-HIV-burden countries face shortages in these areas, creating wait times of nearly two months from blood collection to HIV diagnosis in infants. An HIV-exposed and untreated infant’s peak mortality risk occurs at just six to eight weeks of age. Point-of-care early infant diagnosis is the game-changing innovation needed to close this gap and save the lives of children perinatally infected with HIV.

Postnatal Care

The first few weeks and months of a child’s life are critical to survival. SPAF works within maternity and child wellness clinics throughout sub-Saharan Africa to offer a variety of integrated postnatal care services. We promote continued use of antiretroviral prophylaxis among HIV-exposed infants and continued use of ART for life among HIV-positive women. We also offer counseling on safe infant feeding practices within and outside the context of HIV. We work with child health clinics to offer early and repeat HIV testing and access to optimized HIV treatment in addition to routine child wellness services including immunization, nutrition, and growth monitoring. In many of our supported settings, SPAF offers early child development education to caregivers—ensuring both the physical and the psychosocial health of both parents and children.