Question
What do my viral load test results mean?
5 January 2016. Related: All topics, CD4 and viral load.
Please can you explain how viral load results mean?
I got my results back and I don’t understand them. It says log units is 2.777 and my RNA copies is 599 cp/mL.
Is this low or high? My CD4 count is 697.
Answer
Hi
Thanks for your question – and it is good that you want to understand your test results.
Sometimes this can be dfficult if your doctor has not explained them clearly. It is also okay to ask your doctor or nurse to explain anything that you are not sure of.
Viral loads tests tells you how much virus is in a millilitre of blood (or another body fluid being measured).
When not on treatment, viral load can range from undetectable to several millions. For anyone on HIV treatment (ART), viral load should ideally get to undetectable, This is defined as being less than 50 copies/mL.
Your test results are the 599 copies/mL, so your viral load is still detectable at 599.
The ‘2.777 log units’ from your test results is a slightly complicated way of saying exactly the same thing as ‘599 copies/mL’.
Because viral loads have such a huge range of numbers they are sometimes expressed in ‘log units’ to make it easier to write them on graphs and diagrams. Doctors and scientists use log scales to look at changes to viral loads over time. See this table of log units compared to viral loads in copies/mL.
Whether this is considered high or low depends on whether or not you are on treatment.
- If you’re not on treatment yet this is a relatively low viral load, which is a good thing.
- If you are on treatment, then if you only recently started ART, your viral load might still be going down.
- If you have been on treatment for more than six month, please talk to your doctor about why the results in not undetectable.
For more information about viral loads and how they relate to both treatment and infectiousness you can also have a look at the following links:
Viral Load and Treatment
Viral Load and Infectiousness
If you tell me if you are currently on treatment or not I can provide more individual information, Also, if you are on treatment, when did you start?
This answer was updated in January 2016 from a question first posted on 5 April 2012.
Hi,
The above post explains what an undetectable viral load means, please refer to that.
Hi my name is johanna and tested positive my result says i’m lower than detectable limit please explain to me what does it mean
Hi Kamran,
If you’re on medication and your viral load is undetectable, there’s no need for your wife to be on PrEP. Please see here for more info: http://i-base.info/u-equals-u/
my wife will use (prep) for pregnancy to get negative baby .and when get pregnant i will use condom or not and in which condition i can not do sex with my wife
Hi Kamran,
A viral load of less than 50 copies/mL is undetectable. And yes, if you have an undetectable viral load on HIV treatment (ART) you can not transmit HIV, even if you don’t use condoms.
Please see Undetectable = Untransmittable (U=U) here.
my viral load is 37 copies .but doctor say u can transmit virus to ur partner .and i read in ur site less than 50 copies is not transmittable
Hi Umesh,
What does your doctor say about this result? Not detected means that the amount of HIV in your blood is below the level that the test can detect. The usual viral load test measures down to 50 copies/mL. So the result can be not detected <50 copies/mL.
But you can ask your doctor if the test can only detect down to 150 copies.
Do you have access to your CD4 count? Please let us know.
1 year back my viral load was 116 and in September 2019 my viral report says target not detected in report target not detected box (√ )checked and <150 box unchecked
What is target not detected
Hi Samuel,
If you’re HIV positive with a detectable viral load and you have sex just once it’s unlikely that HIV will be transmitted.
But have you talked to your doctor about your viral load result? You can ask for another test to see if it’s still above 50 copies/mL. It can go down to undetectable again if you keep taking your meds on time.
However, if there is viral rebound it can be because of drug resistance to the meds you’re taking. You can ask for a resistance test to find out about this. But if viral rebound happens, you can ask about switching to other meds that will work properly.
Hello,
My VL is 2,000 . I found this out 9/17/19. Months Before I was undetectable. I did miss a few pills. My question is what is the risk that I passed HIV to my partner. Unprotected sex once since diagnosis.