HAVIN HIVDOES NOT MEAN HAVING AIDS
(Test Version)

By Jaime D. Romero O.

The humanity has faced many mortal diseases through the ages, some of them have been consider as epidemics and have caused plenty of deaths around the world. Plagues as the bubonic destroyed half of the population of Europe in the twelfth century, venereal diseases were the plague for the nineteenth and twentieth century, and lately the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) has presented itself as the plague of the twenty-first century.

The Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome is nowadays the first cause of massive death around the globe. The devastation of this suffering is so huge that there is a direct association between AIDS and death. The main cause for considering that a person has AIDS is that he/she presents the Human Immune Deficiency Virus (HIV) in his/her body system. It is believed that the presence of the HIV in the body is the same of having AIDS. But this belief is wrong, just for having HIV a person cannot be considered as an AIDS patient, it is necessary to present other characteristics such as being genetically predisposed to allow the HIV infected the body cells and to have at least one of a bunch of opportunistic sickness.

The presence of the Human Immune Deficiency Virus in the body system means that a person is a carrier of the infection, this can happened with out any manifestation in the person health, so this person can have the infection for years with out a damage to his/her health. The presence of the infection does not mean that the person have AIDS, just means that this person have a virus in his/her systems which can attacks the cells, unchanging a series of changing in the system which can finish in and AIDS case, but this result is not necessary supposed to happen. There are some people who can have the HIV in their system for a large time but the virus cannot penetrate the cells causing an infections, this is called natural resistance against HIV.

The capacity of stop the penetration of the HIV into the cells is known as natural resistance against HIV. This genetic characteristic is not common, only few people have it. For having this condition it is necessary to have a variation of a gene called DELTA-34, which work in the defense system against cell infections. This variation of the DELTA-34 gene only presented in those cases where both parents have it, and it does not allow the virus to penetrate the cell membrane. So the individual can have a presence of virus in his/her body but the virus cannot penetrate the cell in order to reproduce itself, resulting in the elimination of the virus from the system due to the natural defense system of the body. The people who have a natural resistance against HIV can have the virus in theirs system, and because they are not predisposed to allow the HIV infected the body cells they never develop the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.

When people do not have a natural resistance against HIV, the virus penetrates the body cells and reproduces itself. In this process the virus destroys the defense system’s cells setting the body in a state of defenseless, which is know as Immune Deficiency State, this suffering is not consider as AIDS because AIDS as a syndrome needs to present a combination of sickness known as opportunists. But not everyone who has an immune deficiency state has to acquire an opportunistic sickness; this depends on the recurrence of viral sickness in the geographical location where the individual lives.

In places such as the African countries pneumonia is the main opportunistic sickness that attacks the people in an immune deficiency state for HIV infection. When people have this sickness because of their immune deficiency state for HIV infection, they are diagnosed as an AIDS patient, and they finally die because of that suffering. In other parts of the planet the opportunists sickness are different, but people immune deficiency patient usually have one. There are exception for this rule, in the Nordic countries which have not had epidemics for generations and the environment is clear of opportunistic viruses the immune deficiency patient can live for years even for decades free of opportunistic infections, so in this country a patient can be diagnosed immune deficient because of an HIV infection and this individual does not develop AIDS.

In conclusion to be diagnosed as an AIDS patient is necessary to present a series of conditions, such as to have the Human Immune Deficiency Virus in the body system, that this virus had attack the cells and reproduced itself destroying the defense system cells in the process, causing the condition known as Immune Deficiency state. And finally as a consequence of this defenseless state of the body acquire one opportunistic sickness. If one step of the process can no be executed the individual cannot be diagnose as an AIDS patient. So the fact of having HIV no necessary means to have AIDS.

It is a common belief that HIV is synonymous of AIDS, and for that reason many HIV diagnosed patients think that theirs lives has to finish soon. But in fact and HIV patient can have a large live and never develop AIDS.