HIV - BIO PROJECT

PRINCESS DIANA'S STORY

In 1987, Princess Diana of Wales visited AIDS patients at a hospital in London.

A famous photograph shows her shaking a patient's hand without wearing gloves.

The gesture challenged the once-common (but incorrect) belief that HIV or AIDS could be transmitted by touch.

The moment is demonstrative of Diana's unwavering compassion for other people.

"HIV does not make a person dangerous to know, so you can shake their hands and give them a hug, Heaven knows they need it"

THE FLU

• A person can have HIV for many years before feeling ill.
• flu-like symptoms can occur within the first month after they have been infected.
• These symptoms often go away within a week to a month.

YEAST

• both women and men may experience yeast infections on the tongue (thrush)
• women may develop severe vaginal yeast infections or pelvic inflammatory disease.
• Shingles is often seen early on, often before someone is diagnosed with HIV.

FEVER

• A fever that won't go away
• Sweating while you sleep
• Feeling tired all the time
• Feeling sick all the time

Bodily Changes

• Losing weight-
• Swollen glands (neck, groin, or underarms)
• Oral thrush

How it was first Contracted

• virus was identified in the 1980s

• studies concluded that the first transmission of SIV to HIV in humans took place in Kinshasa in Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo)

The same area is known for having the most genetic diversity in HIV strains in the world.

Many of the first cases of AIDS were recorded there too.

Commonly accepted theory

SIVcpz was transferred to hunters as a result of chimps being killed and eaten, or their blood getting into cuts or wounds on people in the course of hunting

CONTACT WITH FLUIDS

HIV is spread by coming in contact with certain body fluids from a person who has HIV .

Includes…

• blood,
• semen
• pre-seminal fluid
• rectal fluids
• vaginal fluids
• breast milk

These fluids must come in contact with

• a mucous membrane
• damaged tissue
• be directly injected into the bloodstream (from a needle or syringe) for transmission to occur.

Mucous membranes are found inside the rectum, vagina, penis, and mouth.

THROUGH BREAST FEEDING

From mother to child during pregnancy, birth, or breastfeeding.

Baby can retrieve virus from the womb

SEXUAL CONTACT

• Having anal or vaginal sex with someone who has HIV without using a condom or taking medicines to prevent or treat HIV.
• Either partner can get HIV through vaginal sex, though it is less risky for getting HIV than receptive anal sex.

SHARING NEEDLES

• Can recieve virus by sharing needles, rinse water, or other equipment used to prepare drugs for injection with someone who has HIV.
• HIV can live in a used needle up to 42 days depending on temperature and other factors.
• This is a risk mainly for health-care workers

GET TESTED

• Get tested (especially if sexually active) and know your partner’s HIV status.

• Use this testing locator from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)

• recommendations to test all pregnant women for HIV and start HIV treatment immediately have lowered the number of babies who are born with HIV.

SAFE SEX

Have less risky sex

Use a condom correctly every time you have vaginal, anal, or oral sex.

TAKE PREP

• Take pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP).
• PrEP is an HIV prevention medicine for people who don’t have HIV but who are at high risk of becoming infected with HIV.
• PrEP involves taking a specific HIV medicine every day.

NO INJECTION

• Don’t inject drugs!
• But if you do, use only sterile drug injection equipment and water
• NEVER share your equipment with others.

We've come a long way from the days when diagnosis with HIV equaled a death*

sentence.

Today, there are a variety of treatments that, when used in combination can significantly slow down and in some cases stop altogether, the progression of HIV infection.

ART

Treatment with HIV medicines (called antiretroviral therapy or ART) helps people with HIV live longer, healthier lives.

ART can't cure the HIV infection, but it can reduce the amount of HIV in the body.

Having less HIV in your body will reduce your risk of passing HIV to your partner during sex.

HAART

HAART is a drug medical treatment consisting of several drugs→combinations of different types of anti-HIV drugs

Are called HAART, for highly-active antiretroviral therapy (HIV is a kind of virus called a retrovirus).

• Taking HAART therapy is very manageable but not easy. →

• These drugs must be taken at the right time, every single day.

• Also, a range of side effects may occur, including:
• diarrhea, nausea, rash, vivid dreams, or abnormal distribution of body fat.

• if medications are taken incorrectly or inconsistently, the virus can mutate, or change, into a strain resistant to treatment.

Other

• there are now several HIV medications that are only taken once a day.

• If there is resistant virus these may not work and other medication options must be used.