The Truth about
HIV Infected People

To dispel a myth, you cannot spot HIV infected people on sight alone, or by any means other than an HIV test.

To dispel another myth, while HIV, or human immunodeficiency virus, will mutate more often than not into AIDS, HIV is not a terminal illness. It may not happen often, but it does occur that a person can go through their entire life not even knowing that they are infected with HIV. HIV generally takes about ten years to mutate into AIDS, but it's also possible for HIV to never mutate into AIDS.

The Human Cost

It's estimated that AIDS has killed over 25 million people since it was discovered in the early 1980's. However, that's a little misleading. AIDS has never actually killed anyone. Rather, a virus a person suffering from AIDS contracts is what turns out to be terminal.

Tragically, it is currently estimated that about 0.6% of the world's population is infected with HIV.

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Prevention and Lowering Your Risk

Prevention is generally easy, but not really 100% foolproof. Mistakes can happen.

To lower your risk of contracting or transmitting HIV, practice full disclosure with your sex partners. In this day and age, it's not unreasonable to want to know every detail of your partner's sex history, and it's not unreasonable to insist on using condoms, even with longtime partners. Nor is it unreasonable to go in for a blood test and to ask your partner to do the same.

Even if your sexual history is modest, mistakes may have happened. Condoms are sometimes defective, for example. Make sure you know what's going on.

If you do drugs, never, never, never share needles. If you're forming a secret club in your tree house, skip the blood-brothers ritual and have your attorney draw up some contracts, instead. Avoid sharing blood and other bodily fluids, practice sanitary measures at work and at home, etc. Much of prevention is common sense, but much of prevention is neglected, as well.

With proper treatment, as well as a healthy lifestyle, HIV infected people can go on to live productive, rewarding, long lives. There is no cure, but there is education, prevention, and treatment.

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