( CNN ) -- I took care of AIDS patients from 1981 to 1998 in a county clinic in Atlanta . By the time they showed up at the door , many of them had advanced disease . Most died within two years . Before they died , they suffered from untold painful physical conditions in addition to the unique brand of pain caused by the the pervasive social stigma of AIDS . Without effective treatment of HIV , a physician could n't offer much more than supportive care . Then , in 1995 , a `` cocktail '' of three anti-retroviral drugs proved to be successful in fighting the virus -- not completely killing it , but reducing its numbers so its devastation of the immune system was minimized . The treatment worked like a miracle . Patients got better and very quickly . Seeing the transformation of patients from close to death 's door to living healthy lives was one of the most rewarding experiences I 've had as a physician . But the patients are n't cured . They must take drugs for their lifetime . Neither a cure for HIV nor a vaccine to prevent HIV has yet been developed . Now , an HIV-infected baby who was treated with a combination of drugs from birth to 18 months and then not treated for a year was found to be free of HIV infection at 30 months . The child is considered cured . This is the second reported HIV cure in history and the first in a child , and it is rightly making international news . We can all share the joy of a child cured and hope the treatment will bring a better life for infected babies in the future . Kudos to the clinician , Dr. Hannah B . Gay , whose expertise , instincts and treatment of the infant led to this remarkable outcome . But there was another great advance against the HIV virus that did not make big headlines . A simple treatment with anti-retroviral drugs can prevent babies from being infected by their HIV positive mothers in the first place . Of course , a patient cure is much more visible than an infection prevented . Maybe that is why we celebrate cure in a way that we do not celebrate prevention . Toddler 's HIV cure offers global hope . Until the mid-1990s , pregnant women with HIV infection had a 30 % chance of transmitting the infection to their newborn . A landmark study showed that treating HIV-positive pregnant women during their labor and delivery with intravenous zidovudine , or AZT , and then giving the infant AZT syrup orally for four to six weeks reduced the risk of HIV transmission to less than 2 % . Successful prevention means the baby is free of HIV infection and will no longer need treatment . We should also celebrate those babies who were not infected with HIV by virtue of treatment of mother and newborn with this drug regimen . Kudos to the thousands of clinicians who have treated HIV-infected pregnant mothers and their offspring . How do we know the treatment was effective ? We know only by the data meticulously collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Protection since AIDS was first recognized in 1981 . HIV transmission from mother to child during pregnancy , labor and delivery or breastfeeding is known as perinatal transmission . In 2012 , the CDC reported that the combined mother/infant HIV treatment regimen resulted in a decline of perinatal transmission by more than 90 % since the beginning of the HIV/AIDS epidemic . AIDS in the '90s : ' I was n't going to die miserably ' This incredible reduction was accomplished despite the fact that more women with HIV infection were giving birth . How far we have come . Women with health care do not have a problem being tested for HIV . The problem lies with women who do n't have health care and have not been tested . In 2005 , the CDC recommended that if a women arrives in labor in the emergency room and has not had prenatal care , a rapid , 20-minute test for HIV should be done so preventive treatment can be started immediately . Despite the existence of this treatment , babies are still born infected with HIV in the United States and worldwide . Prevention strategies are rarely perfect . That is why we need to have a Plan B for babies with HIV infection -- and the findings of Gay and her colleagues might be just that . The potential impact of this discovery will be far greater in developing countries -- especially in Africa , where thousands of HIV-infected babies are born each year . Of course , what we desperately need to control HIV is a safe and effective vaccine for both infants and adults . Until then , let us celebrate each success . Each one gives hope that we will eventually conquer one of the most formidable of viruses . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Mary Guinan .
Mary Guinan one of the first to investigate AIDS , treated patients from 1981-1998 . She has seen the progress of AIDS as a death sentence to people living with HIV . Comment: Baby cured of HIV infection is great news , but infant did n't have to be infected . She says anti-retroviral drugs can easily prevent transmission from mother to child .