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Some important facts about the evidence of HIV/AIDS:

• Tests for the HIV antibody in people with AIDS show they are infected with the virus.
• HIV has been isolated from individuals with AIDS and grown in pure culture.
• Studies of blood transfusion recipients before 1985 documented the transmission of HIV to previously uninfected people who subsequently developed AIDS.

Before the discovery of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), the virus that causes AIDS, epidemiological studies of AIDS patients’ sex partners and AIDS cases occurring in blood transfusion recipients before 1985 clearly showed the underlying cause of AIDS was an infectious agent. Infection with HIV has been the only common factor shared by people with AIDS throughout the world, including homosexual men, transfusion recipients, human beings with hemophilia, sex partners of infected individuals, infected women conceiving children, as well as health care workers who were infected with HIV while on the job due to accidentally being stuck with a needle used on an HIV-infected patient.

Although it evident HIV is the cause of AIDS, much remains to be discovered about exactly how HIV causes the immune system to break down. Scientists are constantly researching for more information about HIV/AIDS  so people infected with HIV/AIDS may live longer, healthier lives. One important question to answer is why some people exposed to HIV become infected and others do not. Scientists believe it is most likely because of how infectious the other person is and how he/she is exposed. For example, more than 90 percent of humans who were exposed through an HIV-infected unit of blood became infected. So we know blood-to-blood contact is an efficient way HIV is spread. On the other hand, many health care workers are splashed with blood or bloody body fluids and this type of exposure has caused very few occurrences of HIV. Researchers know how HIV is spread and the ways people can help protect themselves from being exposed.

If you would like to speak to someone regarding HIV/AIDS, please call the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) at the toll free number, 1-800-232-4636.

You may write either by mail or email to CDC regarding this subject:

or cdcinfo@cdc.gov