Aids

AIDS stands for acquired Immune deficiency disorder. It is a disease that is very dangerous and it causes your immune system not to work properly so that you can’t fight off any illnesses. It was first discovered in the early 1980’s and has become an epidemic on certain continents like Africa. It is caused by a virus that is called HIV. This stands for human immunodeficiency virus. According to one website, more than 40 million people are infected with the virus now. And half of the people who have the virus don’t find out until they have the symptoms of AIDS. Once the symptoms appear it becomes harder to treat and your life span is shortened.

Scientists don’t really know for certain where the disease started or how it started, but they do think it may have begun in Africa, south of the Sahara desert. Since 1981, 25 million people around the world have died from AIDS, and Africa is one of the hardest hit countries with the disease. According to one website, 96% of the people with AIDS live in third world nations and don’t have the access to medical care and information on how to prevent HIV and AIDS like we do in the United States.

HIV is the virus that causes AIDS and it can be passed a number of ways. One way is through sharing intravenous needles. Drug users often share needles, and if they do this they are sharing blood and passing the virus if one person who used the needle has it. People should never ever share needles. They also say that you should not share razors or any other things that could be contaminated with blood or bodily fluids. Another way is through sex. Sexual contact passes bodily fluids between two people and if one of them has the virus they can pass it. People should never have unprotected sex, and even with a condom, it can sometimes be passed. It can be passed from a mother to her newborn baby through birth or breastfeeding. Before they knew as much about HIV, it used to be passed through blood transfusions. Today, they screen blood very carefully, so this doesn’t happen anymore.

Once a person is infected with the HIV virus, he may not know it at all. It doesn’t have any symptoms, though someone might feel like they have flu or a cold shortly after they are infected. A person can live with HIV without getting the symptoms of AIDS for up