Today's question: "What is HIV?" it sounds a bit strange… Are there still people who don't know anything about it (children don't count)? In addition, for those who are aware of this, for some reason, the concept of "HIV" is associated with the word "AIDS". This is far from true! Let's put everything in its place:
- learn what HIV infection is;
- let's understand how it differs from AIDS;
- learn how to diagnose it.
What is what?
The human immune system deficiency virus (the same HIV) is a general concept of infection. AIDS is already a kind of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, which was caused by HIV infection. It will be years before doctors can diagnose a person with AIDS. In this case, they say that one or more very serious diseases have developed in his body.
How is this happening?
Mechanism of action is to weaken HIV-an infection of a person's immune system until the body begins to develop opportunistic diseases that a he althy immune system has always de alt with.
What is HIV for our body?
This is a slow but certain death… The virus attacks certain cells in the human body, which by their very nature should protect it from various infections. Time passes… The virus is still destroying the cells. As a result, the body is no longer able to defend itself against parasites, bacteria, fungi or cancer.
So now we know what is HIV infection and what is AIDS. These are completely different phenomena. The first attack is a destroyer of the human immune system, and the second is a complex of various diseases developing against its background.
What is an HIV test?
This, in fact, is the diagnosis of this infection. It is possible to determine whether a person is infected or not by examining his blood. In Russian, you need to take an HIV test. For this, blood is taken from a vein, after which it / blood / is sent to a special laboratory for analysis. Keep in mind that any initial positive result will necessarily be more accurately cross-checked. Indeed, in some cases, the test results are false:
- person recently had an acute infection;
- for the simple reason that no test gives a 100% result.
The usual period during which you can find out the results of your analysis is three days. Incidentally, in some countriesto diagnose HIV infection, they came up with a saliva sample. Admittedly, these tests are not as reliable as blood sampling.
Rapid HIV test
This diagnostic method involves using a quick test by donating blood from a finger (and no longer from a vein) in a venous blood laboratory. The result will be known in a few minutes. Paradoxically, this testing method gives an instant answer to the question: is there an infection or not, but it cannot immediately determine whether a person is infected … No, do not think that this is a frivolous thing! The results of this test are as accurate as with traditional venous blood sampling. The main difference is that this is the so-called "window period". It means the stage when the virus cannot yet be detected in the body.
Important! Rapid testing "sees" only antibodies to HIV infection, but not the virus! Therefore, for a correct result, it is necessary that at least twelve weeks have passed since the moment a person was infected.
