Cuba is the first country in the world to stop the transmission of the AIDS virus from mothers to their babies, the World Health Organization said Monday. 
 
 Cuba's also stopped the transmission of syphilis from mothers to newborns -- two feats that show it's possible to control epidemics of both infections. 
 
 "Eliminating transmission of a virus is one of the greatest public health achievements possible," said WHO Director-General Dr. Margaret Chan. "This is a major victory in our long fight against HIV and sexually transmitted infections, and an important step towards having an AIDS-free generation." 
 
 "Eliminating transmission of a virus is one of the greatest public health achievements possible." 
 
 Babies can be infected with HIV at birth or by breastfeeding if the mother is infected. If the mother gets HIV drugs before and after giving birth, and if the newborn is given drugs, the risk falls to less than 1 percent. 
 
 But that means the mother must have been tested and know she is infected, and of course the drugs must be available. 
 
 WHO estimates that 1.4 million women with HIV become pregnant every year. Without treatment, there's as much as a 45 percent chance that they will infect their newborns. 
 
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 Globally, 67 percent of all pregnant women infected with HIV in low- and middle-income countries were able to get the drugs to protect their babies in 2013, WHO said. "The number of children born annually with HIV has almost halved since 2009 - down from 400,000 in 2009 to 240,000 in 2013," WHO says. 
 
 In the U.S., testing and treatment of pregnant women has made mother-to-child transmission rates plummet by more than 90 percent. In 2010, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says, 162 children were infected at birth. CDC says 14 percent of Americans with HIV don't know it. 
 
 "It shows that ending the AIDS epidemic is possible." 
 
 Cuba's success should encourage donors and governments to redouble their efforts, WHO said. 
 
 "It shows that ending the AIDS epidemic is possible and we expect Cuba to be the first of many countries coming forward to seek validation that they have ended their epidemics among children," said Dr. Michel Sidibé, executive director of the United Nations AIDS agency UNAIDS. 
 
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 Similarly, stopping syphilis transmission is easy if women get antibiotics to treat the infection. WHO says nearly 1 million pregnant women worldwide are infected with syphilis annually. That translated to 360,000 babies who were born dead or died soon after birth, were born prematurely or who were born infected in 2012. ||||| A nurse (L) hands out a red ribbon to a woman, to mark World Aids Day, at the entrance of Emilio Ribas Hospital, in Sao Paulo December 1, 2014. 
 
 HAVANA The World Health Organization on Tuesday declared Cuba the first country in the world to eliminate the transmission of HIV and syphilis from mother to child. 
 
 The WHO said in a statement that an international delegation that it and the Pan American Health Organization sent to Cuba in March determined the country met the criteria for the designation. In 2013, only two children in Cuba were born with HIV and five with syphilis, the statement said. 
 
 "Cuba's success demonstrates that universal access and universal health coverage are feasible and indeed are the key to success, even against challenges as daunting as HIV," PAHO Director Carissa Etienne said in the statement. 
 
 Cuba's Communist government considers its free healthcare a major achievement of the 1959 revolution, although ordinary Cubans complain of a decline in standards since the fall of the Soviet Union, the country's former benefactor, in 1991. 
 
 The PAHO and WHO credited Cuba with offering women early access to prenatal care, HIV and syphilis testing, and treatment for mothers who test positive. The two organizations began an effort to end congenital transmission of HIV and syphilis in Cuba and other countries in the Americas in 2010. 
 
 (Reporting by Jaime Hamre; Editing by Daniel Trotta and Lisa Von Ahn) ||||| The number of babies born with syphilis surged from 362 in 2013 to 918 in 2017, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported Tuesday. (Photo: Orbon Alija, Getty Images) 
 
 The number of babies born with syphilis has more than doubled since 2013, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a trend that medical professionals said shows the need to be vigilant about testing and treating the rare but potentially disease. 
 
 The number of babies born with syphilis rose from 362 in 2013 to 918 in 2017, the CDC reported Tuesday. The greatest number of cases were in the South and West. 
 
 Syphilis is a bacterial infection that is easily cured with penicillin. But women with untreated syphilis can pass it on to their fetuses during pregnancy or to their babies during birth. 
 
 If transmitted, it can cause miscarriage, stillbirth or newborn death. Syphilis caused 77 stillbirths or newborn deaths in 2017, the CDC reported. 
 
 For babies who survive, it can lead to an assortment of physical and mental health problems. 
 
 More: Sexually transmitted diseases surge for the 4th straight year, CDC reports 
 
 More: STDs reach all-time high in California, leading to spike in stillbirths due to syphilis, state health authorities say 
 
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 David Harvey, executive director of the National Coalition of STD Directors, called the surge "a systemic failure." 
 
 "We are failing pregnant women in the United States," he said. "We are seeing almost 1,000 babies born with syphilis that can easily be prevented." 
 
 The United States has made HIV transmission from mothers to newborns extremely rare, in part through the federal Ryan White Part D program, which funds community programs that provide care to pregnant women with HIV. 
 
 Harvey's organization wants a similar program to prevent the mother-to-newborn transmission of syphilis. Harvey said pregnant women should be tested for syphilis as early as possible and later in their pregnancies. 
 
 According to the CDC, mothers of one in three babies born with syphilis in 2016 were tested during pregnancy. But they were either infected after getting tested, or they were not treated in time to prevent passing the infection to the baby. 
 
 Thirty-seven states reported cases in 2017. Louisiana ranked first with 93.4 cases for every 100,000 births. 
 
 "We're not proud of these numbers," said Dr. Rebekah Gee, secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health. "Every case of syphilis should be preventable." 
 
 Gee said Louisiana has worked to reduce the number of new cases. 
 
 The state examines every case of newborn syphilis to lean steps that could prevent future cases, she said. One trend they discovered was moms who initially tested negative for the infection or were treated in their first trimesters contracted syphilis during later stages of pregnancy. 
 
 Louisiana requires doctors test pregnant women for both syphilis and HIV in the first and third trimesters. 
 
 The health department has also assigned case managers to Baton Rouge and Shreveport, the two regions with the highest number of cases. They work to raise awareness among doctors about the need to test. 
 
 Case managers and doctors also warn pregnant moms who have been tested or treated that they can contract the infection again, said DeAnn Gruber, the department's director of infectious diseases. 
 
 "Education is really important," Gruber said. 
 
 The Arizona health department's newly formed maternal morbidity review board identified congenital syphilis as a growing problem. 
 
 Arizona's 36 cases so far in 2018 already have surpassed last year's total, state health officials said. Six babies have died at or shortly after birth this year. 
 
 California had the most cases of congenital syphilis in the nation, and the third highest rate, according to the CDC. 
 
 One of the state's biggest challenges is reaching people who don't have access to prenatal care, said Heidi Bauer, chief of STD control for the California Department of Public Health. 
 
 Bauer said common barriers are poverty and unstable housing. Some moms are struggling with substance abuse, and may avoid drug testing or interaction with government agencies such as Child Protective Services. 
 
 California public health officials have attempted to reach out to at-risk people through needle exchanges and in prisons, Bauer said. 
 
 "Syphilis is one of those ancient diseases that tends to reemerge where people are largely marginalized," Bauer said. 
 
 Preliminary figures reported by the CDC last month showed new cases of the most common treatable sexually transmitted diseases – chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis – spiked nearly 10 percent in 2017 to an all-time high. 
 
 These infectious diseases have continued a four-year climb. Analysts cited changing sexual behavior and a lack of awareness. 
 
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– On at least one aspect of health care, the world's most advanced nations can now take a back seat to Cuba. The World Health Organization says Cuba has become the first country to eliminate mother-to-baby transmissions of HIV, reports NBC News. The same holds true for syphilis. Cuba did so not through some experimental treatment but through rigorous prenatal screening of pregnant women. Those who tested positive were given HIV drugs before and after giving birth, and their newborns were treated as well. When that happens, the percentage of infected babies falls to under 1%. "Eliminating transmission of a virus is one of the greatest public health achievements possible," says WHO chief Margaret Chan. "This is a major victory in our long fight against HIV and sexually transmitted infections, and an important step towards having an AIDS-free generation." Cuba's policies didn't completely wipe out such transmissions—two babies were born with HIV in 2013, and five with syphilis—but the numbers met WHO's criteria for certification, reports Reuters.