Women Living with HIV

As of 2023, an estimated 2.5 million people were living with HIV in India, making it the third-highest country globally in absolute numbers. Women with higher CD4 counts experience slower cervical disease progression than those with lower CD4 counts, reflecting the role of immune status. ART has improved life expectancy for WLHIV, but this extended lifetime inadvertently prolongs HPV exposure and increases the probability of progression to invasive cervical cancer. WLHIV face a sixfold increased risk of developing cervical cancer compared to the general population. WLHIV carry approximately 2.6 times the relative risk of acquiring HPV compared to HIV-negative women and demonstrate a lower rate of HPV clearance. In practice, WLHIV are typically referred for cervical evaluation only when they present with symptomatic disease, rather than at routine screening intervals.