Infants in developing countries at risk of potentially fatal illnesses such as diarrhoea can't afford to lose antibodies or the optimal nutrition found in breast milk.

Credit: AFP

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LUSAKA, Zambia: Researchers have devised a simple and cheap method of preventing the transmission of HIV in breastmilk from mother-to-child by 'flash-heating' infected milk to inactivate the virus.

Of the 700,000 children who become infected with HIV each year, an estimated 40 per cent contract the virus from prolonged breastfeeding that continues for more than six months.

The new technique, published in the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes, provides hope that breastfeeding in developing nations could become safer.

Safer milk

National banks that collect, store and disperse human milk already pasteurise it, but commonly use a method that relies on thermometers and timers that can be hard to obtain in resource-poor communities.

The new method involves simply heating a glass jar of expressed milk in a pan of water over a flame or single burner, so can easily be applied by mothers at home.

The research began in 2004 and was driven by HIV-positive mothers from Zimbabwe wanting to know how they could make their milk safe for their babies, said Kiersten Israel-Ballard, from the Berkeley School of Public Health in California, U.S., who coordinated the study.

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends heat-treating HIV-infected breast milk, but so far there has been sparse research into a simple method that could be used by HIV-positive mothers in developing countries.

"We wanted to be sure that there was scientific evidence that flash-heated milk was truly free of HIV and immunologically beneficial," said Israel-Ballard.

Optimal nutrition

Infants in developing countries at risk of potentially fatal illnesses such as diarrhoea can't afford to lose antibodies or the optimal nutrition found in breast milk.

In the study, 84 HIV-positive women contributed breast milk to the research. Tests on flash-heated breast milk showed that the process kills bacteria and the HIV virus, while retaining most of the milk's nutritional and antimicrobial properties.

Canisius Banda, a spokesperson from the Zambia Ministry of Health, said that the challenge would be to educate mothers on how to heat the milk.

Current WHO recommendations state that HIV positive mothers should avoid breastfeeding when safe feeding alternatives are available. But in regions where mothers cannot afford the cost of infant formula or where water is contaminated, the WHO recommends mothers should exclusively breastfeed their babies up to six months of age.