AIDS and the Facts
What is AIDS ?
Aids is a sexually transmitted disease and to date no cure has been found to combat Aids.
AIDS stands for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome:
ACQUIRED
This means you get infected by it: It is passed on by one of these ways.
* Having sex with a person who is already infected with aids.
* Sharing a needle with someone that is taking drugs.
* Being born to a woman who has the aids virus.
* Drinking the breast milk of an infected woman.
* Having a blood transfusion that is infected with aids. The risk of blood transfusions passing on the aids virus is now very low risk due to the blood being screened very carefully.
IMMUNE DEFICIENCY
This means your body is not strong enough to combat the diseases that attack your body.
SYNDROME
This means the various health problems that cause a disease.
The cause of aids is a virus called HIV, once you get infected with HIV your body will make antibodies that will try and fight the disease, they are special molecules that build up to fight the HIV.
You do not catch AIDS, once you have come in contact with any of the above ways where it is acquired you become HIV positive, it is the virus that causes aids.
HIV stands for:
- Human, the virus only affects humans.
- Immunol-deficiency: the effect of the virus creates a deficiency, a failure to work properly, within the body’s immune system.
- Virus: because this organism is a virus, which means one of its characteristics is that it is incapable of reproducing by itself. It reproduces by taking over the the human cell.
It is not easy to identify anyone that has HIV; it can enter your body and remain there for years, steadily and very slowly destroying the body by taking over the human cells.
Your body will try and fight the infection by making antibodies, special molecules to fight the HIV but as the disease continues it slowly wears down the immune system.
Once the immune system is damaged, viruses, parasites and bacteria that would not normally cause any problems can now make you extremely sick.
There is no way you will realize that you have contacted HIV as any symptoms you may experience are very similar to flu or swollen glands, you may feel generally unwell for a short while but these symptoms will disappear and your life will continue as normal.
Times vary for different people as to when AIDS will first appear, it is generally from seven to eleven years before it becomes evident.
The only way you can determine if you have HIV is to have a blood test.
There is no known cure for HIV but certain medicines will help to fight the HIV infection and the infections and cancers that come with the disease.
