Here we describe the risks of getting HIV from injection drug use, and ways to reduce those risks. It is well documented that injection needle users who share unclean needles are at great risk of being infected with HIV. Sharing unclean needles allows a direct exchange of blood from one person’s body into the bloodstream of another. When a person puts a...
Risk Assessment, Sample Scenarios 2 & 3
Scenario 2 A woman has found out that her previous drug partner is HIV-positive. They only shared needles once. She thinks that he got infected after they stopped seeing each other. 1. Was the virus present? We don’t know because we don’t know when he became infected. 2. Was there enough concentration? Yes. HIV in blood may be transmitted if two...
Risk Assessment and Sample Scenario 1
Transmission questions can often not be answered in a black-or-white fashion, i.e. “this is always risky, that is never risky.” The answer will usually involve two questions, going back to our conditions necessary for HIV transmission to occur: What is the substance (“body fluid”) and can it possibly contain HIV in sufficient quantity to...