HIV puts teen girls at higher risk for pregnancy than peers, study says

Teen girls and young women with HIV are more likely than their peers to get pregnant, even if they are aware of their infection, a new study has determined.

A paper published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that adolescent females between the ages of 13 and 24 who had the disease not only conceived more often than HIV-negative women, but also had a higher incidence of pregnancy complications.

The study's authors noted that teen girls who have contracted HIV through risky behaviors, like unprotected sex or intravenous drug use, were five times as likely to get pregnant as those who has been "vertically infected," meaning that they had contracted the disease from their own mothers at birth.

Researchers did not determine whether these pregnancies were intentional or unplanned, but they suggested that future studies take such a variable into account.

They added that HIV-positive women who get pregnant, deliberately or otherwise, are endangering both their unborn child and their sexual partner.

Though HIV shows few symptoms at first, it ultimately results in serious illnesses caused by opportunistic infections. Individuals who have engaged in risky behaviors may purchase online testing services in order to determine the state of their sexual health.