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HIV is a virus. A virus is a very small living thing that can reproduce and spread. Viruses cannot survive on their own - they need an animal or person to live within. When a virus finds a home within a living organism, it replicates (begins to make copies of itself) within this organism's cells. A virus can damage the cells it replicates in, which is one of the things that can make the infected creature become ill.
The immune system is a group of cells and organs which protect your body by fighting viruses and infections. In humans, the body's immune system usually finds and kills viruses fairly quickly. People can become infected with HIV from other people who already have it, and, when they are infected they can then go on to infect other people. Basically, this is how HIV is spread.
HIV stands for the 'Human Immuno-deficiency Virus'. Someone who is infected with HIV is said to be 'HIV+' or 'HIV positive'.
What makes HIV so dangerous is that it attacks the immune system itself, the very thing that would normally get rid of a virus. It particularly attacks a special type of immune-system cell - without these, the immune system's ability to fight off the virus is weakened, and HIV spreads throughout the body.
This process isn't visible, and there isn't any way to tell just by looking if someone's been infected by HIV. But a blood test can detect the virus in the blood from about three months after infection first occurred. A person infected with HIV may look and feel perfectly well for many years and they may not even know that they are infected. Then, as the person's immune system weakens they become increasingly vulnerable to illnesses, many of which they would normally fight off easily. |
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And what's AIDS?
AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) is an extremely serious condition, and at this stage the body has very little defence against any sort of infection.
As time goes by, a person who has been infected with HIV is likely to become ill more and more often until, usually several years after infection, they become ill with one of a number of particularly severe illnesses. It is at this point that they are said to have AIDS - when they first become seriously ill, or when the number of immune system cells left in the body drops below a particular point. |
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Without drug treatment, HIV usually progresses to AIDS in an average of ten years. This average, though, is based on a person having a reasonable diet. Someone in a resource-poor area who might not be adequately nourished may well progress to AIDS and death much more rapidly. HIV antiretroviral medication can prolong the time between HIV infection and the onset of AIDS. New medicines are being developed, and theoretically, someone with HIV can live for a long time before it becomes AIDS. These medicines, however, are not available in many poor countries around the world, and millions of people who cannot afford or access medication continue to die.
HIV is found in the blood and the sexual fluids of an infected person, and in the breast-milk of an infected woman. HIV transmission occurs when sufficient of these fluids get inside their body. There are various ways a person can become infected with HIV.
- unprotected sexual intercourse with an infected partner (the most common);
- sharing needles or other contaminated injection or skin-piercing equipment;
- blood and blood products through, for example, infected transfusions and organ or tissue transplants;
- transmission from infected mother to child in the womb or at birth and breastfeeding.
HIV is not transmitted by casual physical contact, coughing, sneezing and kissing, by sharing toilet and washing facilities, by using eating utensils or consuming food and beverages handled by someone who has HIV; it is not spread by mosquitoes or other insect bites.
There is still no cure for AIDS. There is antiretroviral medication which slows the progression from HIV to AIDS, and which can keep some people healthy for many years. In some cases, the antiretroviral medication seems to stop working after a number of years, in other cases people can recover from AIDS and live with HIV for decades. But they have to take powerful medication every day of their lives, sometimes with very unpleasant side-effects. But there is still no way to cure HIV, and at the moment the only way to remain safe is not to become infected.
Already, more than twenty million people around the world have died of AIDS-related diseases. In 2004, 3.1 million men, women and children have died. Around twice the amount who have died until now - almost 40 million - are now living with HIV, and most of these are likely to die over the next decade or so. The most recent UNAIDS/WHO estimates show that, in 2004 alone, 4.9 million people were newly infected with HIV.
It is disappointing that the global numbers of people infected with HIV continue to rise, despite the fact that effective prevention strategies already exist. |
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