Free How to Be a Great Lover by Lou Paget Page B

test and an AIDS defining opportunistic infection. There are approximately twenty-five known opportunistic infections.
A positive HIV test and a T-cell count under 200 per cubic millimeter of blood.
A positive HIV test and pulmonary tuberculosis, invasive cervical cancer, or recurrent bacterial pneumonia.
HIV attacks the immune system, leaving the body unable to fight off common sicknesses or other diseases. Somewhere between 600,000 to 900,000 people in the U.S. are infected with HIV.
HIV infection can be spread through blood, semen and vaginal fluids, and to infants through breast milk. Touching, eating, coughing, mosquitoes, toilet seats, swimming in pools, and donating blood do NOT spread HIV. What is rare but can occur is transmission from kissing a highly infected person; it is more likely that when HIV is contracted through kissing, the transmission occurs through blood than through saliva, resulting from extremely poor oral hygiene (in other words, through open sores in the mouth). HIV is not an airborne virus and cannot be spread by casual contact.
There are usually no symptoms accompanying HIV. People can get the virus and feel terrific for many years. Unfortunately, the virus almost always leads to AIDS eventually, and because it is the immune system that fails, the symptoms for AIDS can look like anything from a cold to cancer. Although there is no cure for AIDS, there are new drugs that dramatically slow down the effect that HIV has on the immune system. Every sexually active man and woman should have an HIV test and wait the six months required to ensure a clean bill of health before having sex without a male condom.
Sadly, it isn't always enough to accept a verbal declaration of good health. Many, many people have been deceived by lovers who claimed to be HIV-negative and weren't. Sharon, the girl friend of a seminar attendee, had a whirlwind romance with a sports newscaster and married him in a romantic ceremony on the fifty-yard-line of his alma mater. Shortly after returning from their honeymoon, she was disturbed by his sudden lack of interest in sex. After a few months, the marriage quickly deteriorated and they were divorced within a year, but not before Sharon discovered she was pregnant. Although her ex-husband seemed excited about becoming a father, his initial enthusiasm gave way to less and less frequent visits with his young daughter. Then, one day while Sharon was watching Dan Rather do an interview with a man dying of AIDS her heart sank. Although the man's face was shielded from the camera and his voice was altered, because of his mannerisms and the fact that he was wearing a sweater she had given him on a past Christmas, Sharon realized that this dying man was indeed her ex-husband and the father of her daughter. The next day she went to get tested and discovered that she was HIV-positive.
It is very important that you ask to see the results of your lover's HIV test and all his tests for sexually transmitted diseases, especially if you don't know him well, but even if you do. It is also important that he see the results of your tests. Rather than make him ask, it is a good idea if you offer the results as a show of good faith, opening the door for him to do the same. If your lover refuses to show you his test results, you refuse to have unprotected sex with him. Remember, it is your health and quite possibly your life, that is affected by his being secretive. No one would want to keep his or her good health a secret.
When obtaining an HIV test, be mindful of the difference between confidential and anonymous testing. They are not the same. When you have an anonymous test, you are identified by a number or letters only, not by your name, your social security number, or any other identifying information. After the blood sample is taken, you confirm that the numbers and letters on the vial and on your identification slip are the same. A week later you go back to the clinic where the test was taken