HIV is a rather dangerous virus that naturally attacks the body's immune system, targeting particularly the CD4+ cells, which are essential in fighting everyday diseases and infections. Understanding how HIV develops, how it affects the body, and any potential treatments against it are all important aspects of understanding HIV and living with the virus.
03 October 2024
5 min read
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How HIV Attacks the Immune System
Once it enters the human body, HIV immediately begins to attack directly to the body's immune system. Its progression is very slow and is highly variable depending on different factors such as good health, age, and the timeliness of diagnosis and treatment. Normally, HIV destroys major cells, CD4+ cells, which normally protect the immune system from invaders. In the replication process, it not only damages the infected CD4+ cells but also produces more viruses. This starts a very vicious cycle that, unless treated, may severely weaken the immune system.
Early Diagnosis of HIV is Important
Early diagnosis and immediate treatment importantly affect the prognosis. Without treatment, the immune system can be severely damaged, and one would be susceptible to critical infections and diseases. Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, or AIDS for short, is the last stage of HIV, wherein it significantly weakens the immune system by opening it up to opportunistic infections. Not everyone with HIV progresses on to this full-blown disease of AIDS. Many times early diagnoses and treatments can prevent this full-blown disease.
Stages and Effects of HIV
The virus affects the body through different stages that ultimately result in AIDS if left untreated. Still, medical science has been able to overcome this within the past thirty years by slowing down or reducing the stages considerably. With proper and consistent medication, it is now possible for people diagnosed with HIV to regain their lives to healthiness, although many are never developing into AIDS.
Early Symptoms of HIV
Initial symptoms of HIV infection usually begin within 2 to 6 weeks after exposure and are similar to the flu. During this time, one may also experience seroconversion illness. The body is making antibodies that fight against the HIV infection; this obviously shows that the active immune response to the virus is occurring at this stage. Other symptoms, such as skin rash, fever, swollen glands, sore throat, or joint or muscle pain, may also appear and generally last about a week or two. After this stage, the symptoms can disappear for a few years, yet one shouldn't think that the virus is 'dormant', it continues to replicate and infected cells, thus destroying the immune system.
HIV and the Immune System
HIV infects the human immune system through attachment and penetration into the host's T cells, the CD4 cells, which are essential elements of the body's defense mechanism. While taking over the host cells, the virus replicates, thereby destroying those cells and moving on to infect other cells. A normal count of CD4 cells ranges between 500 and 1500. If left untreated, over time, a person with HIV infection will experience a decline in their CD4 cell count. If this count falls below 200, the body's immune system becomes highly weakened, and thus apparent symptoms of illness and signs begin to appear.
AIDS-Defining Diseases and Opportunistic Infections
People infected with HIV are susceptible to opportunistic infections due to worn out immunity. These infections largely occur when usually harmless microorganisms take advantage of the weak immune system and cause disease. Opportunistic infections include thrush, pneumonia, cryptococcal meningitis, tuberculosis, toxoplasmosis, cancers such as Kaposi's sarcoma, and cytomegalovirus. Such infections as those listed above develop into AIDS-defining illnesses when they spread beyond their usual sites.
Co-infection with HIV
Co-infections are other diseases that either may influence HIV, or be influenced by it. Hepatitis and tuberculosis are among the most common co-infections with HIV.
HIV's Impact on the Cardiovascular and Respiratory Systems
HIV predisposes your body to influenza, fever, and pneumonia. If preventive treatment against HIV is not taken, then the victim is highly susceptible to pneumonia, tuberculosis, and pneumocystis carinii pneumonia. These can be in the form of fever, cough, and dyspnea.
People living with HIV are also at a higher risk of developing lung cancer, primarily because of the weak state of the body that opens up the lungs to various respiratory problems. There is also a chance of developing PAH, or pulmonary arterial hypertension-a type of high blood pressure supplying arteries to the lungs-potentially putting strain on the heart over time. With a weakened body defense, such patients fall prey to tuberculosis, an airborne bacterium that attacks the lungs and accounts for much AIDS-related mortality worldwide.
Effects of HIV Medication on the Body
Though a cure for the virus has not yet been found, there is medical treatment that can reduce the viral load-an individual's amount of virus in his or her body-to undetectable levels within one's blood. Currently, the most common treatment for HIV is antiretroviral therapy, or ART. It consists of three different medications put together to prevent resistance to the virus.
Also, the regimen is generally referred to as 'fixed-dose combination' because it enables patients to take only 1 or 2 tablets per day. Most of them also require good adherence to these drugs as prescribed by a healthcare provider for sustaining their efficacy.
Despite these many benefits, ART drugs may result in some side effects: high cholesterol levels, headaches, high blood sugar levels, tiredness, skin rashes, diarrhea, vomiting, and nausea. Other potential side effects may be glucose intolerance, anemia, pancreatitis, hepatitis, and defective kidney functioning. Metabolic effects such as insulin resistance, hyperlipidemia, and redistribution of body fats occur in some cases. Bone disorders such as osteoporosis and osteopenia may also arise.
Long-Term Outlook
However, despite the side effects related to this treatment, long-term studies have confirmed that, in general, ART is safe and has greatly increased the life expectancy of people living with HIV. With early detection and intervention, the evolution of HIV treatment methods can considerably improve the quality of life and life expectancy for someone diagnosed with this infection.
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