AIDS – Causes, Symptoms & Therapy

AIDS means ‘Acquired Immuno-Deficiency Syndrome’ and as such describes an acquired immunodeficiency disease that progresses over many years after the initial infection and ultimately leads to death via simple bacterial or viral infections. The disease is triggered by an infection with the human immunodeficiency virus, better known under the abbreviation HIV.

The disease AIDS is often wrongly equated with the HI virus (HIV). If you become infected with the HI virus, those affected are referred to as HIV positive. It is only after the disease has broken out that one speaks of AIDS.

Causes (transmission and contagion)

The transmission of this infection takes place mainly via direct contact. Since the blood of an HIV-infected person must always be considered contaminated, special safety measures must be observed when dealing with HIV-infected people. In principle, healthy skin represents a reliable barrier against the penetration of the HIV virus, but protection is no longer secure in the case of mucous membranes.A reliable route of infection is direct mucosal contact, for example during sexual intercourse, where the pathogen can spread from person to person via minimal tears and bleeding in the mucous membrane. Homosexuals and bisexuals with frequently changing sex partners are also a main risk group for AIDS and were the first social group in which AIDS attracted attention worldwide in the 1980s.

Another risk group are intravenous drug addicts, especially if minimum hygienic standards are not met and several people share the same needle.

Medical personnel are also at risk of infection through needlestick injuries. Before better controls were introduced in 1986, hemophiliacs or those in need of a transfusion were in constant danger of contracting an HIV infection with a blood transfusion. Since then, the risk of becoming infected with a blood transfusion has fallen sharply, but even today it cannot be completely ruled out.

Another transmission route is the infection of the child of an HIV-infected mother – this can get the virus during pregnancy, but also during childbirth or while breastfeeding with breast milk.

While the number of sick people in Western countries is quite manageable and is mainly distributed among the risk groups mentioned, AIDS or HIV infection is endemic in African or some Asian countries and is often passed on directly from mother to child, especially here .

Symptoms and course

The initial infection with HIV is usually asymptomatic, sometimes with flu-like symptoms. Some infected people develop a rash or swollen lymph nodes, but overall the infection is usually not noticeable. In the subsequent period, which can last from months to 10 years, the affected person is indeed infectious and can also pass the virus on to other people, but usually does not know anything about his infection.

Fever attacks, night sweats, hair loss and weight loss can occur again and again, even progressively, but the “full picture” of AIDS often only develops after many years: the focus here is on opportunistic infections and tumors that the immune system can no longer fight off .

Typical for the clinical picture AIDS are the so-called Kaposi’s sarcomas, nodular or patchy tumors of the skin, various bacterial and fungal pneumonia, fungal infestation of the oral cavity, tuberculosis, ulcer-like herpes infections and various variants of lymph gland cancer, which are favored by the HIV infection.

The HIV virus infects T helper cells throughout the human organism and paralyzes a control center in the body that is of crucial importance for the virus defense.

The viruses multiply in the body over the years and can weaken the immune system to such an extent that it can no longer get simple infections (flu, fungal diseases, etc.) under control. HIV-infected people do not die directly from the HIV virus years later, but from opportunistic secondary infections.

Complications

The outbreak of AIDS follows years of human infection with the HI virus. As long as the viruses only lived in the human body, he was not in acute danger and was able to lead a largely normal life. AIDS means that the HI viruses have weakened the immune system to such an extent that an opportunistic disease has broken out. Compared to the course of this disease in a previously perfectly healthy person, complications depending on the disease are very likely. For example tumours, it is likely that they will spread rapidly and unhindered and metastasize rapidly. There are no longer any immune cells that can stop them. Inflammation and infection take on a shape and course as if there were no immune system. The affected patient will get worse rapidly and the usual symptoms of the disease will take on the most severe possible course.

Although drug treatment is usually initiated for AIDS, it will not have any curative success. It merely alleviates the symptoms of the opportunistic disease and can briefly prolong the patient’s life. Another complication of AIDS is that the affected person can catch other germs at any time, which lead to infection and worsen the general condition. The patient will not get better at this stage of his illness – death is inevitable.

Treatment and therapy

A number of drugs are now available to treat AIDS that can control the infection and lower the viral load, which is the number of viruses in the patient’s blood.

In addition to the so-called antiretroviral drugs, which are intended to directly prevent the virus from multiplying, the prevention and treatment of opportunistic infections (vaccinations, antifungals, etc.) is also very important. Even today, however, AIDS cannot be cured with certainty.

Prevention

Preventing the infection is therefore particularly important in preventing the disease AIDS: No unprotected sexual intercourse, especially with frequently changing partners.

In addition, no drug abuse with shared syringe needles, careful handling of blood products and contaminated materials in everyday medical practice.

In the event of needlestick injuries to medical staff, the company doctor must be consulted immediately.

If there is evidence of a risk of infection, the doctor can administer post-exposure prophylaxis (measure to prevent infection). These immediate measures are associated with strong side effects and should be carried out as soon as possible after the risk infection, within a few hours.