The Facts Of Aids Essay Research Paper

The Facts Of Aids Essay, Research Paper

AIDS is the plague of the 20th century, but how much do we really know about this deadly disease?

HIV is a virus that gets into the body and flows through the bloodstream. AIDS is the disease that is caused by HIV. Once you are diagnosed as HIV positive, you do not automatically have AIDS. There is a possibility of being HIV positive, and not having AIDS. Most people do not know it is the infections that break down the body’s immune system rather than the AIDS that kills paients.

HIV can be prevented in many ways, but they are not always followed. People die when they don’t play it safe. That’s why we have to spread the word on prevention.

There a three main ways the HIV can be spread:

1. sexual intercourse

2. intravenous drugs

3. blood transfusions (which are very rare now because all blood is tested)

HIV is spreading like wild fire among adolescents because they don’t believe it can happen to them. Sixty-one percent of 14-21 year olds are engaged in sexual intercourse. The problem we have to deal with is the spreading of this disease among our generation.

A small percentage of people who use condoms still get HIV because:

1. misuse of condom

2. use of drugs or alcohol which can impair judgment or proper use

3. the condom could be defected

The AIDS virus can be spread in many ways. AIDS can be transmitted by direct contact of bodily fluids from an infected male or female.

The AIDS infected blood contaminates uninfected blood. The three most common ways of transmission are: sexual intercourse, blood transfusions of infected blood, and the sharing of intravenous needles which may have contaminated blood still in them.

The virus cannot be contracted in many of the ways people think it can. There is a very low concentration of the virus in tears and saliva, so these cases of transmission are very rare. There are no known cases of transmission through mosquitoes or any other animals.

Another common way of AIDS transmission is mother to child transmission. The virus can be transmitted to the child from the mother before or during the delivery of the baby. The other mother to child transmission case is through the breast milk that he/she is fed in the early stages of the child’s life.