Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) is a retrovirus that infects the cells of the human immune system, thus permitting opportunistic infections to eventually cause fatal diseases.
Actually, most of the people consider HIV as the “AIDS virus.”
But HIV is a very tiny that is not easy to catch but once it enters the human body, it automatically generates millions of its copies daily and finally devastates the body’s immune system.
Thus, the immune system finds difficulty in fighting against infectious diseases.
Ways HIV Is Transmitted:
Normally, HIV resides in blood and in other body fluids that contain blood or white blood cells, responsible for attacking and destroying the foreign cells in the body and it can be easily transmitted through several causes such as
Unprotected Sexual Intercourse: You will be infected with HIV virus when you have vaginal, anal or oral sex with an infected person and if you don’t use a condom or other barrier because that person’s blood, semen or vaginal secretions will directly enter your body.
Moreover, this virus can also transmitted from shared sexual devices when they’re not washed properly or covered with a condom (Female Condoms) because the HIV virus that is present in the semen or vaginal secretions of infected person enters your body, during intercourse, through small tears that can grow in the rectum or vagina.
Sharing Drug Injection equipment: Remember that HIV virus can easily be transmitted through shared needles and syringes that are contaminated with infected blood. So, sharing drug equipments can put you at higher risk of HIV and other infectious diseases.
Therefore, by avoiding the use of sharing injected drugs, by sterilizing the drug equipments or by changing the equipment, you can prevent this deadly infection.
Infected blood: Normally, the HIV virus can be transmitted with the use of infected blood and blood products in blood transfusions.
From mother to child: Today, even the newborn baby is also having chances of getting infected with the HIV virus. It can be transmitted from mother to child during pregnancy, delivery, or breastfeeding.
The rate of mother-to-child virus transmission is increasing each year however this rate can be reduced when the pregnant women receive proper treatment for infection during pregnancy in order to protect her baby from getting infected with HIV virus. With this, the rate of infected babies will reduce significantly.
Other transmission methods: The virus can even be transmitted through transplanted organs or tissues or through unsterilized dental or surgical equipments.
Ways HIV Is Not Transmitted:
Even, it is more important for you to understand the ways that HIV virus is not transmitted because most of you believe it to be a contagious disease and can be transmitted easily to you from infected person in any way.
Remember that to get infected with HIV, the blood fluids must enter your body. You can’t get infected through normal contact such as shaking hands, hugging, sharing clothes, sharing utelsils, socializing, supporting, insect bites, swimming, dancing – with HIV or AIDS infected person.
