Instant HIV results for newly born babies

WAKISO - Newly-born babies at Kasangati Health Centre IV exposed to the HIV virus from their mothers will now be tested and instantly have their results.

This comes after the government, through the health ministry and the Uganda Virus Research Institute, donated a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) machine to the health facility.

It will be used by lab technicians to generate instant results.

The health centre receives as many as 300 expectant mothers every month, who include those living with and those without HIV.

"But those ones who are positive we advise them to be on medication to avoid infecting their unborn babies," said Brian Ssemugga, a lab technician at the facility.

He added that no all heed the advice.

"Sometimes, we receive cases of mothers who have not been on medication and after delivery we have been getting blood samples from their new born babies and take them to central public health laboratories to run different tests.

"It has been taking from two to three months to have the results,"said Ssemugga.

"When we find out that the baby is HIV positive we automatically put that baby on medication. With this new machine, we shall be able to run all tests in one hour and have instant results."

"Putting the new born babies on HIV treatment on the same day of delivery will allow children to live longer than those ones identified after a longer time," he said.

Sister Sylvia Kasumba, who is the in-charge at the health centre, called on expectant mothers to take advantage of the new machine in order to save their children's lives in case they have been exposed.

The health centre is the only one in Wakiso district with such a machine. All the others take their tests to government laboratories in Kampala.

Kasumba made it very clear that all tests to be done using the new machine are free of charge.

Wakiso district Chief Administrative Officer Dunstan Yiga Mukasa asked medical personnel to handle the machine with care as most of the health centres in the district will be taking some tests tobe done there.