This just pisses me off!

Fredro

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Ya know, I sometimes read through some of the profiles of people on the internet and check them out. I understand that people become HIV+ and I do not hold that aspect against them.

That being said, I'll say this - So many times, I have read profiles where a person writes "HIV+ but undetectable" or "POZ but viral load is undetectable". This makes me think that these people are trying to make it look like they are no risk/low risk to a NEG playmate. People are having a hard enough time understanding the message about safe/safeR sex without throwing this crap into the equation.

Why do these people decide to throw that business in their profiles about low or undetectable viral loads? Am I missing something here? Is a person with a low viral load any less virulent than a person with a high viral load? Is it worth finding out by playing unsafely?

Don't mean to piss any one off but I really don't get it.
 
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Why assume these statements are for the sole benefit of NEG playmates? Perhaps these statements are not so much about virulence but to quantify their health state across the spectrum of HIV. Such statements are more concrete than say..."HIV+ and healthy". What's "healthy" to one may not be to another; undetectable can be meaningless as well, but more people (POZ & NEG) understand that. Besides, kudos to the person credit for disclosing to begin with.
 

Tattooed Goddess

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Might i add my 2 cents in here as well? I believe this statement is probably not to assume they cant spread the virus, but to give notice to the people who might be interested that they dont look or appear sickly. Some people are in the more advanced stages of AIDS and might be on their way out the door so to speak.

I think this gives information that they have a lot of life left in them for potential relationships, long term wise.
 

Fredro

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You both are correct about all that. Those aspects did not occur to me.

I did try to go back and change my header from "This pisses me off" to "I don't understand this". It seemed too harsh.
 

B_Monster

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Its a legitamate diagnois' numbnuts, I believe it mean their viral load is under 75, another words undetectable. It doesn;t mean they can no longer transmit the virus and Im sure they know this...Get your facts dude.

Last I checked you can't catch anything but ignorance on the net.
 

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Its a legitamate diagnois' numbnuts, I believe it mean their viral load is under 75, another words undetectable. It doesn;t mean they can no longer transmit the virus and Im sure they know this...Get your facts dude.

Last I checked you can't catch anything but ignorance on the net.

Maybe you should get your viral attitude checked out. Sounds fatal DUDE.
 

Fredro

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Its a legitamate diagnois' numbnuts, I believe it mean their viral load is under 75, another words undetectable. It doesn;t mean they can no longer transmit the virus and Im sure they know this...Get your facts dude.

Last I checked you can't catch anything but ignorance on the net.


Hey, I was only trying to understand all this. The first two put things into perspective and helped me understand it all. No need to get testy. You tell me to get my facts. I think that's what I was trying to do.
 

Fredro

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But ya know - On the other hand - How many people out there read these profiles and ignorantly assume that the person has a viral load so low that you can't become infected by them?

I was talking to a guy one night a long time ago. He said "You know, ***** really likes you. He's poz but his load is so low that it's almost like he's negative."
 
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Its a legitamate diagnois' numbnuts, I believe it mean their viral load is under 75, another words undetectable. It doesn;t mean they can no longer transmit the virus and Im sure they know this...Get your facts dude.

Last I checked you can't catch anything but ignorance on the net.

Okay class...

1) The only legitimate, and medically acceptable diagnosis is "HIV disease" (ICD-9: 042) - this diagnosis covers the entire spectrum of the disease from asymptomatic HIV+ thru ARC (AIDS-complex) to full-blown AIDS.

2) Undetectable refers to the blood testing, NOT the disease. All viral load tests have a cut-off point below which they cannot reliably detect HIV. This point is called the limit of detection and varies from one test to another.
However, just because the level of HIV is too low to be measured by these tests, it does not necessarily mean that the virus has disappeared entirely. The virus may still be present in blood, but in amounts too low for the test to pick it up. Viral load tests only measure the amount of HIV in the blood. Even if you have an undetectable viral load this does not mean that your viral load in other parts of your body, such as your lymph nodes, is undetectable.

3) For older viral load tests, the lower limit of detection was 400 or 500 copies. However, ultrasensitive tests measuring to 50 copies are now routinely used. Some tests can measure even lower and are mainly used in research.

4) Having undetectable viral load is desirable for two reasons: A very low risk of developing AIDS and a very low risk of developing resistance to the drugs the person may be taking.
 

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Having undetectable viral load is desirable for two reasons: A very low risk of developing AIDS and a very low risk of developing resistance to the drugs the person may be taking.

Simple enough and now it makes sense; keep it simple stupid, thats my moto.
 

BlackIsKingSize

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Yeah, it's just a way of letting people know they're currently healthy (knock on wood) so they don't worry that they'll be in and out of the hospital, bed ridden, or likely to die as soon as you get attached. If they were trying to lull someone into a false sense of security they'd probably just not admit being positive at all.
 

B_Nick8

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Hey, I was only trying to understand all this. The first two put things into perspective and helped me understand it all. No need to get testy. You tell me to get my facts. I think that's what I was trying to do.


Ignore him; he's an idiot. You asked a valid question and you're getting valid answers. You did the right thing.