that would be a very hard decision to make. i really don't know what i would do if I was in the situation. I hope i wouldn't have to be either.

I dont know , thats a really tough question, Wanting a baby can just eat your heart up, but as a mother you never want your baby to suffer and I would think that being born with HIV would be suffering! Just an all around hard question

Personally, I wouldn't. I would be a foster parent but I wouldn't have my own.
If I conceived, I would have the child because abortion is not for me.

there are way to have your own child with out passing one the hiv. you coudl alwayws get a serigate mom. if you can aford one or you could adoped but i dotn think i would got throw a full prgo by my self knowing i could pass something like that on to some one so small. i guess it all depends on the person. if you had got prgo and carried full turm there are things they can do to help prevent it from passing on. there are meds and you can have a planed c section. but im not shure if i could do it that way or not.
I think thats the hardest question i have bean asked in a long time lol

no

no no no

people die of hiv
why in the heck would you bring a child into the world when they have adisease that will kill them?

"why in the heck would you bring a child into the world when they have adisease that will kill them? "

Lots of people do. Not just HIV-Cystic Fibrosis, etc etc. Being pregnant with a baby and being HIV positive is a gamble, but there are drugs that can be given that have made definitie improvements in outcomes for babies. Especially in South Africa, where one in three women are HIV pos, they have noted tht when prenatal care is sought early, the chances of passing the infection on to baby are greatly reduced. Personally, though, I would not do it.

If I was bored enough with my life to want to spawn and I had HIV, I wouldn't have a kid. HIV is certainly not a fun thing to have, and doG knows the thing would probably contribute to the spread of the disease when it started kissing and having sex (if it didn't die before that age, anyway).

It's not worth it - healthy kids irk me badly enough, so I certainly wouldn't want to deal with a messed up little diseased child.

Or, if I was HIV positive and had the money to raise a child, I'd instead donate money to research used to try and find cures for HIV...rather than force an innocent kid into a lousy, embarrassing life because I was selfish enough to breed with the knowledge of the disease being passed on to him/her.

Well, we could totally broaden this, but they're all hard questions... cystic fibrosis, cerebral palsy, autism, HIV, etc.....

but maybe that's better for the abortion debate

if i knew there was any chance my child would get a disease i had or was carrying then no i would never even take the chance. that would be selfish.

or thats what i think
also if i was pregnant and they found out my child would be/have a disease like cerebral palsy or womething that would impair him or her badly enouigh i would NOT continue the pregnancy

sillyakchick i didnt know there were drugs that were used to help in certain situations thank you for telling me that because i wasnt aware of it before you learn something new every day

and for once i partially/somewhat agree with cambion

I'd never do that. I'd rather adopt. Unless there was some HIGHLY effective way to avoid infecting my baby.

Because of the risk of passing the disease to the child, definitely not.

Even with drugs that protect the baby I wouldn't have a child if I had a disease that cut my life expectancy down by such a great amount. It would be selfish to knowingly bring a child into a situation where they would possibly have to watch their parent suffer, die, and go on without the guidance of a mother or father.

Coincidentally, I just sat through a lecture today by the CEO of a non profit HIV/AIDS organization. She said that in the past five years, her organization has a 100% success rate of keeping babies born from HIV mothers from developing AIDS/HIV.

Here is a thread from me on this subject back in Dec.

http://ehealthforum.com/health/topic117434 .html

"I have also found on google scholar articles that indicate the average life span after someone finds out they are HIV is 24 more years. It is contingent on taking meds religiously and having a healthy lifestyle."

Personally I think it's incredibly irresponsible and selfish for people who carry serious diseases and genetic disorders to reproduce. If they want a child they should adopt. However I'm not into dictating other people's reproductive decisions, no matter how selfish I think they are.

AMEN! People LIVE with HIV, they die from AIDS, there is a huge difference! I would...compassion is my thing and I would welcome that baby with open arms...hugs and kisses and lots and lots of LOVE

first, i have to say i would totally try to conceive if i wanted a child-- the risk factors are decreasing all the time with modern medicine-- i know mommies with HIV and healthy babies!!

now, comments like that hurt me....babies are beautiful no matter what sort of issues their are! they should never be referred to as "things" and you act like HIV is a deformity!-- its a virus... one that nyone sexually active could get, one you may have and not know it... you can live a happy like with HIV, you choose to have a "lousy, embarrassig life" why would you be embarrassed of something you couldnt help anyway?

Is the risk worth it?

Why was my pic taken off. Monkey's are cute too, you know.

Everyone has a right to be a parent hiv or not what matters is that one will be able to take care and love that child as a parent and hiv makes no difference aspecially now that there's mother to child prevention here is South Africa we had succesfull birth rates of negetive babies coming from positive mothers ....someone once said what is the use of giving birth to a child and die and live him motherless after 5 trs well in that case now that there's arv's ppl with hiv live longer to see their kids get married ...people forget that even giving birth on it's own pos or neg is a risk you may die on that bed so must I be scared of getting preggies because I fear death or even fear that after 5 yrs of giving birth I might have a car accident and die ppl think out of the box and be reasonable we all have needs and disires weather hiv pos or hiv negetive...that my opinion

Parenting is a priviledge, not a right.