Medical Questions & Answers » sexual disease

AIDS by tongue kissing ?

medicalquestions — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 06:01:32 +0000

Question: Can you catch AIDS by tongue kissing?
One-line questions such as this, scribbled on a scrap of paper, indicate to me that the public education about AIDS still has a long way to go!
NO. You cannot catch AIDS from kissing—no matter how passionate. AIDS cannot be caught by any form of casual encounter. It cannot be caught 1 shaking hands, by a cough or sneeze, by dirty toilets or by spa baths. It theoretically possible, although unlikely, to catch AIDS from oral sex.
Normal intercourse and anal sex, as well as any method of transfer of contaminated blood products from one person to another (eg. a shared needle) are the only methods of AIDS transmission. Injections given by doctors or dentists are given using needles that are used once only. Even ear piercing is done by the use of stud guns that cannot transmit AIDS.
AIDS is quite a difficult disease to catch, but if you are promiscuous in your sexual habits, or are involved with illegal drugs, your chances increase dramatically. Condoms offer some protection against AIDS, but not 100% protection because they can burst of come off at the wrong time.

How AIDS is catch

medicalquestions — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 06:06:07 +0000

Question: How can you actually catch AIDS? I see all the advertisements, but I worry that it might be easier to catch than they say.
You can catch AIDS (acquired immune deficiency syndrome) by sexual intercourse with a man or woman who is already carrying the AIDS vitus (human immunodeficiency virus—HIV), by receiving blood from such a person, or by using a syringe needle previously used by a victim.
It can be transmitted by a person who is showing no signs of the disease, and may never develop the disease, but who carries the vitus.
It can NOT be caught by other forms of body contact including kissing. It is not highly contagious, and is actually quite hard to catch.

Risk of AIDS for couple

medicalquestions — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 06:01:12 +0000

Question: Is AIDS still a risk for couple who have normal male/female sex?
The risk in western countries of transmitting AIDS from one person to another is highest in injecting drug users and homosexuals, but it is still a problem with heterosexual sex. The saying that when you have sex with someone, you are biologically having sex with every other person that your partner has had sex with, is still true. Although less than one in ten AIDS cases occur from heterosexual sex in western countries, there is still the risk of other sexually transmitted diseases.
In Africa and Asia, the situation is vastly different, with virtually all cases of AIDS occurring with male/female sexual contacts. In some African countries, up to one in three people in the entire population have AIDS, while in southeast Asia one in 20 people in Cambodia are infected.
The incidence of AIDS has steadily dropped for several years in developed countries with better education, and safe sex techniques (eg. using condoms) but seems to have reached a plateau now, with new cases being diagnosed at about one third the rate they were at the peak of infections in the early nineties. About 600 people a year in Australia catch AIDS every year.