Talk:Special Program of Assisted Reproduction

HIV "discordant", possible POV-ness?

From the article:

The Special Program of Assisted Reproduction (SPAR) is a program offered to HIV discordant couples at the Bedford Research Foundation’s clinical laboratory [1]. The program takes advantage of ART (Assisted Reproduction Technology) procedures (including "sperm washing") to assist couples achieve a pregnancy who would otherwise risk transmitting the father's HIV infection to the mother and the child through intercourse.

I'm presuming HIV-discordant means one partner has HIV and the other does not; this is an educated guess, however. My question is: why is the assumption implicit that it is always the male who is the HIV carrier in practice?

My guess is that this is unintentional: it isn't saying that it the man who always without exception brings HIV into the relationship, but that when it's the woman who's carrying HIV, one can achieve risk-free conception by just using IVF. (Risk-free as far as the father is concerned: the baby is another story, but there's not much that can be done about that.) That is, no special techniques are required. --Saforrest 16:37, 4 May 2007 (UTC)