{"id":121,"date":"2018-01-16T12:00:15","date_gmt":"2018-01-16T12:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.i-base.info\/qa\/?p=121"},"modified":"2024-10-14T09:19:25","modified_gmt":"2024-10-14T09:19:25","slug":"is-it-possible-to-have-sex-with-someone-with-hiv-and-not-catch-the-virusis-it-possible-to-have-sex-with-someone-with-hiv-and-not-catch-the-virus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/121","title":{"rendered":"Can I have sex with someone who is positive and not catch HIV?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yes, there are lots of ways to make sure HIV is not transmitted during sex.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. One of the easiest and most effective ways is just for the HIV positive partner to be on treatment. An undetectable viral load makes HIV untransmittable. (See: The evidence for U=U<\/a>).<\/li>\n
  2. Another relatively recent option is for the negative partner to use PrEP. This is an oral drug that when taken as prescribed is highly effective. (See:\u00a0UK guide to PrEP<\/a>).<\/li>\n
  3. You can use condoms which are an effective barrier against HIV (and other STIs). Condoms need to be used carefully, preferably with plenty of lube. (See: How to use a condom<\/a> (male and female).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    HIV is a much less infectious virus than many other sexually transmitted infections (STI’s).<\/p>\n

    Even without a condom, the risk from a single exposure is less than, for example, 1 in 300. The actual risk becoming infected varies depending on many factors. These include the type of exposure, whether the other person is HIV positive, how high or low their viral load is, the duration and roughness of the sex etc.<\/p>\n

    If the partner is HIV positive, then viral load is the most important factor. The PARTNER study<\/a>\u00a0reported zero HIV transmissions after 900 couples had sex more than 58,000 times WITHOUT condoms. In this study undetectable viral load was defined as being less than 200 copies\/mL.
    \n    https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa-on-the-partner-study<\/a><\/p>\n

    Risk factors for penetrative sex without a condom with someone who has a very high viral load could be as high as 1 in 10 (10% risk). But the risk is effectively zero with someone who is taking treatment and who has an undetectable viral load.<\/p>\n

    This question was updated in January 2018 and November 2016 from an original answer posted in June 2007. i-Base no longer answers individual questions about HIV transmission and risk. (See:\u00a0Question 1 at this link<\/a>).<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Yes, there are lots of ways to make sure HIV is not transmitted during sex. One of the easiest and most effective ways is just for the HIV positive partner to be on treatment. An undetectable viral load makes HIV …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all-topics","category-hiv-transmission"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25017,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121\/revisions\/25017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/i-base.info\/qa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}