HIV is thought to have gone from apes to humans in the 1920s, but the first death officially took place in 1959. The AIDS explosion occurred only in the 1980s, when the disease was usually discovered at its most advanced stages. and there was no treatment.

When the first medications appeared, they did not always work for everyone and sometimes only prolonged the patient's life for a few months. Today, antiretroviral treatment is quite effective, and estimates show that the HIV-positive has a "survival" of more than 50 years from the start of treatment, leading a virtually identical life span of those who do not have the virus.

Although there is no cure, this medication can reduce the amount of infected cells to very low levels, so that HIV is no longer detected in the bloodstream. When this happens, the seropositive patient is called “undetectable”. Many studies have tried to analyze the transmission rate of these people to negative partners and now a new guideline points out that this contamination does not happen!

Patients on antiretroviral treatment do not have HIV in its active form

No transmission

The news had already been advanced in July during the 9th International AIDS Society Conference and has just been made official by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). At least sexually, carriers of the virus who are already on treatment do not transmit HIV to their partners.

"In three different studies, including thousands of couples and unprotected sex or pre-exposure prophylaxis (PREP), no transmission of HIV to an HIV-negative partner was observed when the HIV-positive person was virally suppressed, " the statement said. CDC.

The news has been viewed with great enthusiasm by the community that studies the virus, as this may help lessen the stigma that HIV-positive people carry. Even so, the CDC warns that non-transmission only happens if the seropositive has an undetectable viral load, that is, with the treatment being done very rigorously.

Truvada, the PREP drug, which prevents contamination, began to be available in Brazil in 2017 and is indicated for serodiscordant couples.

Brazil: reference in treatment

In the US, unlike Brazil, access to antiretroviral medication is paid, so some people are slow to begin to control the spread of the infection to the point where it becomes AIDS - not every HIV-positive person has the disease, as it is only considered so when The body is already weakened by the lack of medication.

At this point, our country is one of the largest references in the world, as SUS provides all the necessary medication to control the virus. Follow-up is ongoing and if by any chance the medicine no longer works, it is detected early on and a change in medication again leaves the person undetectable.

However, it is important to note that the study only refers to HIV, but it is not the only sexually transmitted virus. Thus, even if contamination does not occur if the partner is seropositive and undetectable, other diseases may take advantage of the unprotected relationship.

In Brazil, the most common cocktail against HIV gathers three drugs in just one pill daily