Abstract
While the prevention of HIV transmission through breastfeeding is considered in most programs to depend on the attitude of the mothers, ethnological research conducted in 1998-1999 revealed the influence brought to bear by health workers and by those who share the mother's everyday life. Have these social aspects undergone change in Burkina Faso? The results of the ethnographic study conducted from 2003 to 2007 show that mothers who do not have enough economic or social autonomy, or enough support from the child's father, are prevented from applying preventive recommendations by factors such as the risk of stigmatization, social norms regarding breastfeeding and contradictory discourse among health workers. Frequently, the mother only manages to protect her child by creating a distance between the “social actors” involved in infant feeding and her baby. Nevertheless, there have been changes: more fathers support the mothers, especially when they are themselves HIV-positive; exclusive breastfeeding is made easier through the promotion of breastfeeding for all children; more possibilities are available to receive the support of associations. But the risk of unwanted disclosure of the mother's status is still an important issue in two circles of influence: the one involving the baby's father, the family and neighborhood, and the other involving health services and PLWA community organizations.