HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus)

Causes and Treatment for HIV

A very good evening to all of you. I am Dr Hardik Thakkar. I am a MD physician, and an infectious disease expert speaking from Mumbai. Today I would like to take this opportunity to speak to you on HIV.

It is one of the most dreaded diseases, which can infect a person. As you know about the mode of transmission,

• the most common mode of transmission is through the sexual route, whether through the heterosexual route or through the homosexual route.
• The second common mode of transmission is accidental injury or from needle stick injuries or accidental injury from blood contamination; that is, contamination of the body surfaces with the blood.
• The third, uncommon cause though, is through blood transfusion.
• The fourth cause, which is not very common these days, is through the pregnancy, and we are using medication so that this does not happen to the child.

Coming back to the disease, what happens is, with this disease, it affects the helper T cells of your immune system. So as a result of this the CD4 cells, they decrease in the number and the helper cells decrease in the body and they are not able to mount an immune attack on any infection and they can come and attack your body. As a result, the immunity of the person goes down, he gets more vulnerable to infections like tuberculosis, fungal infections, candida infections, respiratory infections, diarrhoea and meningitis. This is because, the immune system is hijacked by the virus. And that is the reason, this is a disease everybody is afraid of. At the moment we do not have any curative options available.

However, we do have medications that help you to suppress the viral load. As a result the CD4 counts increase, and your immunity increases, and the people live a longer life. At the moment I would like to talk about the newest launch of the ART medicine which is dorita.This is a game changing molecule because it is very effective. It does not have side effects. It is produced in India at a much affordable rates.

For more information on the disease and about the different treatment options available , you can get back to me through my website or through lybrate.com. Thank you very much.