Texas House Bill 1795: HIV Testing for Pregnant Women

At home watching the news, I caught a moving headline about a new law that took effect this month in my home state of Texas which calls for testing pregnant women in their third trimester for the virus that causes AIDS. As I reminisced on my two pregnancies, I remember having countless blood tests done which would leave me feeling woozy, sweaty and wanting to scream and run out the door like a small child. Through my own personal drama I could have sworn I had an HIV test at one point, so I researched a bit further.

Before this law took effect, the state had a requirement that physicians were to administer HIV tests to pregnant women during the initial prenatal visit and when the child was born; however, a woman’s HIV status can alter through the course of her pregnancy with neither the woman or her obstetrician even knowing it. Once a woman goes into labor, it could cause irreparable damage to the baby. The law would change this by requiring physicians to test women for HIV in their third trimester unless the woman objects to doing so.

The law took effect on January 1st, 2010 and was introduced in House bill 1795. In it, any pregnant woman who has a positive HIV test can immediately receive antiretroviral drugs which would help them lessen the risk of transmitting the virus to their baby. In addition, any child whose mother tests positive for HIV can also get treatment immediately after birth and for six weeks thereafter. If a woman decides not to get tested, they can choose to do so and will be shown how to take the test anonymously. They will also get information on the risks associated with HIV transmission. According to the spokesperson for the Department of State Health Services, Allison Lowery, the pregnant women will be billed in order to take the HIV test but the test should be covered by Medicaid or personal/group health insurance.

Researchers feel the testing during the first prenatal visit is vital because it allows the obstetrician and pregnant woman to create a birth plan which may need to include a delivery by cesarean section if the woman contains high rates of the virus in her blood. The HIV test is very important because a mother can transmit the virus to her newborn baby during delivery when the baby is exposed to his/her mother’s blood. The statistics of mother-to-child transmission are alarming. Twenty-five percent of women who are HIV-positive will infect their babies if they are not treated correctly. If a woman receives proper treatment during her pregnancy, this number goes down to a risk of only one percent. Dr. Judy Levison, a professor of obstetrics at Baylor College of Medicine in Waco, Texas hopes laws like these will substantially reduce the number of mother-to-child HIV transmissions. She states, “No woman should deliver without knowing her HIV status.”