How we can stop HIV

In this section you’ll read about how HIV is transmitted, how it is not transmitted, and how you can protect yourself and others from HIV.

How people get infected with HIV

Different germs get passed from person to person in different ways. Some, like cold viruses, can be passed along rather easily, by a sneeze or a handshake. Others, like the West Nile virus, can be transmitted by an infected insect.

HIV is not like that:

• HIV cannot be passed from person to person through casual contact like shaking hands or sneezing, or touching a doorknob or a toilet seat or any other surface.
• HIV is not transmitted through the air—you cannot get HIV by breathing.
• You cannot get it from a mosquito or any other insect or animal.
• HIV cannot pass through unbroken skin.
• Even though there may be some HIV in the saliva (spit) of an HIV-positive person, there seems to be something else in spit that deactivates the virus. In simple terms, you cannot get HIV from kissing.

So how do people get infected? The short answer is that people become infected with HIV only when the virus gets into their blood. Next you’ll read about three ways this can happen.