The human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV, damages the immune system’s ability to fight infection. HIV can progress to AIDS if not treated (acquired immunodeficiency syndrome). People infected with HIV developed serious disease quickly at the outset of the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s. Today’s medications, on the other hand, help to reduce the amount of virus in the blood, allowing HIV-positive persons to live healthier, longer lives and avoid developing AIDS.

More than one million people in the United States with HIV, and one in every seven of them is unaware of their status. HIV symptoms can be difficult to spot. Acute retroviral syndrome, or flu-like symptoms, affects 40 percent to 90 percent of persons within a month or two of HIV infection (ARS). However, HIV symptoms may not develop for years, if not a decade, following infection.

According to Mayo Clinic, one should go for HIV test if he/she begins to notice the following symptoms.

1. Frequent high fever.

A low fever of up to 102 degrees F might be one of the early indications of HIV. If there is a fever, it is frequently accompanied by other moderate symptoms including weariness, enlarged lymph nodes, and a scratchy throat.

The virus has entered the bloodstream and is beginning to reproduce in vast quantities.

2. Sudden skin rashes.

Rashes on the skin can appear early or late in an HIV infection, and they can even be an indication of AIDS. The rashes could be bacterial or viral, or they could be caused by an overgrowth of yeast on the skin.

This was yet another clue that he wasn’t suffering from ordinary allergies or a cold. They looked like boils on the arms, with some irritating pink spots. Rashes can arise on any part of the body.

3. Sudden weight Loss.

Weight loss, also known as “AIDS wasting,” is a symptom of advanced HIV infection and may be caused in part by chronic diarrhoea.

If you’re already losing weight, your immune system is likely to be compromised. This is the patient who has lost a significant amount of weight while eating as much as feasible. This is an after-hours presentation. There are still a lot of these around. Antiretroviral therapy, on the other hand, has made it less common.

4. Persistent dry cough.

The first indicator that something was awry was a dry cough. It’s easy to misinterpret it as a case of bad allergies. But it lasted for a year and a half, and it just got worse. Antibiotics, Benadryl, and inhalers would not solve the problem. Allergists didn’t know either.

This symptom is a “insidious cough” that might last for weeks and doesn’t seem to go away.

5. Night sweats.

During the early stages of HIV infection, almost half of persons have nocturnal sweats. This HIV symptom is the body’s response to becoming overheated or attempting to defend itself against an infectious pathogen. Night sweats are more common later in infection and have nothing to do with exercise or ambient temperature.
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