QUICK INFO

HIV/AIDS 411

HIV is easily preventable. You don’t have to get it. Here are ways to avoid it:

• By waiting till you’re older to have sex and then only when you’re in a long-term, loving relationship.
• Having one sexual partner and remaining faithful to your partner. Remember,
you are sleeping with your partner's sex partners, too.
• Always using a condom, especially during penetrative sex (penis to vagina/ anus/mouth)
• Testing for HIV (together with your partner).Even if you are HIV-positive –
and on treatment – the same healthy lifestyle messages apply.
• Find safe ways to enjoy your sexuality (masturbate, touch your partner
without penetration or allowing your body fluids to mix).
• Eat as healthily as you can and keep fit by exercising regularly.
• See a doctor or a nurse regularly

I'M POZ

If you are HIV+ here are some important points to remember about the highly-active
anti-retroviral treatment (HAART) you’ll be on:

• HAART can help HIV-positive people live healthy, longer, productive lives.
• Children can have mothers and fathers for longer.
• Workers can stay employed for longer.
• Money can be used on education and food instead of mounting medical costs.
• HAART does not cure HIV/AIDS.
• HAART reduces the amount of HIV in the bloodstream for about 10 years – even more for some people – delaying the onset of AIDS and allowing HIV-positive people to live healthier and more productive lives.
• But eventually many HIV-positive people still die from AIDS-related diseases or the side-effects of the treatment.
• An HIV-positive person on HAART is still able to infect his/her sexual partners and be reinfected with HIV if he/she engages in unprotected sex.
• People on HAART have to take medicines for the rest of their lives – every day.
• You can’t miss any tablets because the virus can quickly get out of control, and become resistant to treatment.
• Life on medicines is not easy – stay HIV negative! Stay free from HIV!
Avoid STIs/STDs!

SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED INFECTIONS/DISEASES:

Diseases from sex are another consequence of sex that we have to know about. Peeps call them STIs (sexually-transmitted infections) or STDs (~ diseases)
Some STIs can plague you for the rest of your life. Some can make you infertile so you won’t be able to have kids. Some make it easier to get infected with the HIV virus; peeps with STIs are 3 to 5 times more likely to get HIV. The sores on your genitals act like doorways for the HIV virus to go through.

There are two ways to avoid STIs: don’t have sex where fluids are exchanged
or use a condom correctly.

There are many STIs so if you think you have one get help immediately. Some infections progress quickly without medical help plus you might infect others.

STIs Look Bad—Sometimes:
You can’t always see them even if you look close so you won’t always know you have them. But if you see these run to the clinic:

• Sores on the penis or vagina. Sometimes many, sometimes one. They can hurt or not. Often your pelvic area glands will swell up.
• Discharges. If you see fluids that look yellow or white oozing from your penis or vagina,
and if it smells bad, you might have an STI. Girls might also get stomach pains or get fevers.
• Peeing hurts. If it burns or is painful when urinating you most likely have an STI.

HIV/AIDS

If you haven’t heard of HIV/AIDS by now you haven't paid attention. Everybody should know about it. Like, it’s an STI usually caused by unprotected sex. Or, you can’t always see if somebody has HIV/AIDS. And, get a blood test to see if you really have it or not.

You know about bad sex and relationships. You don’t have to rush into sex with anybody; just say no. Look for nice people to date and love. Have a single sex partner. If all that isn’t for you at least wear a condom correctly to stop infections.

Maybe you believe it couldn’t happen to you. Or, you are such a great lover that you know what to do and worrying about STIs will ruin your sex life. And, maybe you just don’t care. Well, do care. Love your life, it’s the only one you got.

We are the generation everyone says will save the world. But we gotta get informed and know what’s out there. HIV/AIDS is real though we can’t always see it. No meds can make it go away.

HIV is a virus that will give you flu-like symptoms, make you vomit, keep you awake, and give you lots of other miseries. And the drugs aren’t much better for many who take them. The drugs can extend your life, though the results vary for everybody.

If you get HIV then you become “HIV positive”. You might not show symptoms
or feel them for upwards of 10 years. During that time you will infect others.

HIV uses your body’s cells to manufacture itself and then spread through your whole body.

AIDS is when your immune system fails so badly that many diseases take the opportunity to make you really sick and might kill you. So, what could kill you
is cancer, TB or pneumonia, to name a few.

QUICK FACToidS

• High-risk or unsafe sex help pass HIV via blood, semen, vaginal fluids and pus discharge resulting from STI's like gonorrhea.
• That kind of sex includes penis to vagina/anus/mouth (oral sex)
• HIV-infected pregnant women can pass HIV to her baby during birth and from breast milk.
• Dirty needles shared during drug use will pass it to you
• Dirty tattoo and piercing tools/needles can give you HIV and Hepatitis C
• Bad blood transfused from unprotected blood supplies can give you HIV
• Bloody injuries involving an HIV+ person can give you HIV
• Insects, like mosquitoes, cannot give it to you at all.
• Kiss everybody you want to and hug them, too, it’s all good.
• Condoms correctly used can block HIV and other STIs

RESPECT

Show some compassion and respect to those who have HIV or AIDS. They need companionship and love just like you would if you had it. How would you really like
to be treated if it happened to you?

REPEAT AFTER ME

I have the right to choose to have sex or not.
I have the right to choose when to have sex.
I have the right to choose who to have sex with.
I have the right to choose safer sex over unsafe sex.
I have the right to express my sexuality my way.
I love my body.
I love my life.

Have fun. Feel pride. Make choices. Give respect. Be responsible. Empower yourself.
Love your life.

WEB SITES FOR QUICK INFO:

Adolescent AIDS
Advocates for Youth
Ambiente Joven (Spanish)
LIFEBEAT (English)
LIFEBEAT (Spanish)
Quierosaber (Spanish)
Spread The Know
STOPAIDS
SEX ETC
Toughchoices
UNICEF
VH1 Know HIV
YOUTHAIDS

CARTOONS! Click here to see a cartoon illustration of HIV cells attacking
the Immune System. In English and Spanish versions.