HIV care continuity for women in postconflict Tigray: assessing mother-to-child transmission rates, infant health and cervical cancer screening
Despite wartime disruption, HIV-positive women in Tigray sustained near-complete prevention of mother-to-child transmission and high cervical cancer screening rates.
A multidomain cohort study across 7 Tigray health facilities (n=2,515 HIV+ women) documents near-elimination of mother-to-child HIV transmission by 2025 despite wartime health system collapse, alongside high cervical cancer screening uptake (98.3%), though cascade completion at 76.9% represents an ongoing gap. Findings demonstrate resilience of facility-based services while highlighting that population-level outcomes are likely substantially worse than these selected access data suggest.
What the study was
- Study design
- Retrospective multidomain cohort study across 7 health facilities
- Population
- Women living with HIV in post-conflict Tigray (Ethiopia), n=2,515 for cervical screening cascade; n=405 HIV-exposed infants
- Sample size
- 2515
- Category
- Public Health
- Maturity
- Validated
- Journal
- BMJ Global Health
Why it surfaced
Rare post-conflict health system data with n=2,515; near-elimination of MTCT amid wartime collapse is a remarkable public health finding; cervical cancer screening cascade data in war-affected HIV+ women directly relevant to early cancer detection watchlist.
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