How Does HIV Cause AIDS?

Lalit Bhardwaj
3 min readDec 28, 2021

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AIDS refers to a serious medical condition where the individual faces a life-challenging situation at hand due to the introduction of HIV in the human body. Hence the individual becomes weaker, and the capability of the person fighting the disease lowers gradually, which can ultimately lead to death. Usually, the virus is spread via channels of sexual contact or during pregnancy, or even breastfeeding. Through the launch of the human immunodeficiency virus, slowly the immune system starts weakening, and it reaches a stage where the individual has developed a medical condition called AIDS.

Not all individuals who get exposed to HIV get AIDS. The last and the weakest version of the immune system indicates the development of AIDS. It might take many years to recognize the disease in the person’s body to indicate that it is an AIDS disease. One of the biggest concerns among medical professionals is that there remains no strategic method to cure the person of this medical condition. The only ray of hope for the patients remains the medicines that have shown slow but effective results and have even reduced the death ratio.

How to identify the exposure to HIV?

The symptoms caused due to HIV and AIDS can be variable since they are dependent on what phase the infection has progressed in the individual. Most individuals face an illness similar to the one caused by the flu virus. The common symptoms tend to develop within the first four weeks of the entry of the virus. This stage can be referred to as the initial stage of the infection and can be visible for some weeks. Some commonly seen effects of the virus are:

· Signs of fever

· The ache in the forehead

· Muscle pain

· Chances of rashes in the skin

· Throat tends to become sore

· Experience a loss in weight

· Cough signs can develop in the individual

· Experience sweats at the night

These symptoms are of the mild level, and it is quite hard to observe by ourselves whether the infection has started or exposure to HIV. However, the amount of virus exposure in the blood might be very high even if you cannot realize that it is the onset of the infection. Hence, the infection can reach the next stage due to the lack of proper reception and awareness about these symptoms. The virus slowly magnifies in the bloodstream without giving many signs that the immune system is weakening over time.

The slow damage to AIDS

The virus must have started its action in the blood and the individual’s immune system. It might have contributed to the slow destruction of the immune cells that help the body fight the infections and help them to keep the body safe. So once these cells start to go off, the person enters a stage of AIDS due to the lack of proper treatment at the right time. When the infection gets unchecked, there are high chances of becoming AIDS. So at this stage, the immune system is in the weakened stage and has reduced capability to help the body fight against germs. Hence symptoms that are seen include:

  • Versions of severe diarrhea.
  • The chances of lymph glands becoming swollen with time.
  • Extreme weakness in the body.

So if you have any doubts regarding the exposure to the virus or if you face any these symptoms, it is better to meet the doctor at the earliest.

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Lalit Bhardwaj
Lalit Bhardwaj

Written by Lalit Bhardwaj

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