I know a young girl, about seven years old. She told me that her mother died of AIDS. Is it possible that she could have AIDS, too? How long do children with AIDS usually live?

Kate

The treatment of children with HIV (human immunodeficiency virus), the virus that causes AIDS, is changing fast, just as care for adults with HIV is changing.

A baby whose mother is infected with HIV can catch the virus during the pregnancy, at delivery (which is probably most common) and by breastfeeding. In some rare cases, the means of infection to newborns is unclear. Only a few years ago, about one-quarter of babies born to mothers with HIV acquired the infection. Today, such women and their newborns often get antiviral medication, and the level of transmission has dropped dramatically, to as low as 2 percent. Some think that the risk to newborns can be eliminated entirely in the United States in the future.

In the past, an HIV-infected child would usually get sick in the first year of life, and within a few years, most would have full-blown AIDS -- a syndrome of infections and certain tumors. Now, by taking newer treatments for HIV, children born with the infection are living into their teenage years. There is no way to know how long these treatments will work because they are so new, but it is not inconceivable that children born with HIV will live well into adulthood.

As to your question, it is quite possible that the child you know is infected with HIV. The fact that her mother died of AIDS obviously put her at grave risk, assuming the mother was infected when her child was born. However, the risk of passing the infection to the child was at most 25 percent, and if the mother was being treated, the risk may have been much lower. Also, it would be somewhat unusual for the child you know to be healthy at age 7 without having taken medication, though it is possible. I am sure that whoever is caring for this child knows that she is at risk and has had her tested for HIV.