World Aids Day: 4 Things You Should Know About HIV
Did you recognize that if you’re HIV-positive, you will underneath bound circumstances not be ready to pass the virus to somebody else?
Read on to understand how this is possible.
For the past few decades, myths and information concerning HIV/Aids have place individuals at magnified risk of infection, causing the condition to assume pandemic proportions, especially in South Africa.
Ahead of World Aids Day, South African doctor Dr Sindi van Zyl, a specialist in the HIV and Aids field, spoke at the Cipla HIV/Aids press workshop about what everyone should know if you are HIV-positive or not, you ought to understand.
-If you have got HIV, it will take up to twenty years for symptoms to point out
HIV attacks the CD4 cells, a kind of white blood corpuscle, and uses them to make copies of the virus (called the viral load) and eventually destroy them.
This method will persist for several years with none symptoms, that is understood because the symptomless section.
During this point, you have got no plan the virus is in your system, although your immune system is being weakened in the process.
“There square measure teams of society in our country World Health Organization believe they’re ‘immune’ to HIV, World Health Organization suppose it happens to ‘them’ however ne’er to ‘me’.
-There square measure HIV self-test kits on the market, but most people are unaware of it
There square measure currently many approved home-testing HIV kits on the shelves.
If you’re ironed for time, van Zyl says these at-home tests square measure a extremely convenient possibility.
Professor Ian Sanne, commencement Director and CEO of Right to worry, conjointly told fakazaza that self-testing is usually recommended, but one shouldn’t panic should the results indicate you’re HIV positive.
“We advocate that if the result shows you’re HIV positive, you don’t get distressed and rather have a second, complementary test done at a health clinic or by a general practitioner.
“The kit works very well and the studies that we’ve done on these kits show very good results, but the prevention method still needs to be linked to the self-test kit,” Sanne explains.
The International Aids Society supported the U=U accord statement of the interference Access Campaign.
This statement makes the crisis that not each HIV-positive person is infectious.
A person living with HIV, World Health Organization has associate degree ‘undetectable microorganism load’ won’t transmit the virus to their partner.
And as long as your microorganism load remains undetectable, your chance of passing on HIV to a sexual partner is zero.
“And this is often vital as a result of not solely will this stop transmission, however it conjointly changes the manner individuals feel concerning themselves,” says van Zyl.
It is vital to recollect that having associate degree undetectable microorganism load doesn’t mean you’re cured of HIV.
If you quit taking treatment, your viral load will increase and become detectable.
-Proxy testing is not encouraged
“Proxy testing is when you assume you’ve HIV negative because your partner tested negative, and we don’t encourage that,” says van Zyl. “Each person has to know their own status.”
-You want three or a lot of ARV medicine to treat HIV
Antiretroviral medical aid (ART) can continually embrace a mix of 3 or a lot of ARVs that is taken to suppress the virus’s ability to create copies of itself.
However, van Zyl says that the majority of people believe that two ARVs are sufficient.
“We continually offer 2 medicine to dam the life cycle of HIV, because different drugs work at different phases of the life cycle to stop the virus from multiplying.
And this is often why taking medication daily is completely crucial.”
–Side effects of current ART not that dangerous compared to past ART
The treatment for HIV that we’ve these days is way superior to what we have a tendency to had years past, says van Zyl.
“People’s bodies accustomed get malformed as a result of the treatment within the past.
And that put people off medication.
And there have been many medicine that caused lipodystrophy [abnormal distribution of fat], but we’ve moved away from those drugs and only use them if we’re absolutely desperate.
And if the treatment you’re on brings concerning aspect effects that square measure intolerable, I encourage you to inform your doctor in order that the medication may be modified.
HIV prevention is really a ‘basket of things’, says van Zyl