There's a big difference between the symptoms of

There's a big difference between the symptoms of

HIV and the symptoms of advanced HIV, also known as AIDS.

HIV is a virus that attacks your immune system. During its initial assault (which is known as acute infection or primary infection), your immune system tries to mount a defense. That defense can cause many people to develop symptoms that usually go away after a few days.

Here's the catch: Those symptoms, when they do occur (most people experience only very minor symptoms, some people experience none at all), are almost impossible to tell apart from symptoms you might get if you have another type of viral infection, such as the flu.

Symptom	Possible Symptom of Flu?	Possible Symptom of Acute HIV?
Fever	Yes	Yes
Chills	Yes	Yes
Night sweats	Yes	Yes
Rashes	Yes	Yes

The only time you're likely to develop any symptoms of HIV is during the "acute" phase, which lasts for six to 12 weeks after you've been infected. Once that period ends, you may well go years without your body giving away any sign whatsoever that you have HIV.

This is why it's so important for everybody to get tested for HIV regularly (preferably once a year as part of a routine health checkup). Having HIV may be scary, but having HIV and not knowing it is a lot scarier, as we're about to explain.

Having "AIDS" means your HIV disease has advanced to a point where it has seriously damaged your immune system. Once you've been infected with HIV, the virus begins to slowly, but surely, eliminate your body's CD4 cells, which you need in order to fight off other infections and diseases. AIDS is an official term that indicates that your CD4 count is (or has at one time been) under 200, or that you've had one of 16 "opportunistic infections." These conditions tend to develop among people who have had HIV for several years without receiving any treatment. In fact, you can be diagnosed with AIDS at the same time you're diagnosed with HIV -- and many people are, since they don't get tested for HIV regularly. The symptoms of AIDS are often the first sign that people see indicating that something is wrong.

Scientists have developed a wide range of HIV medications that can essentially stop HIV from damaging your immune system, or at least dramatically slow the rate of damage. But if you don't know you have HIV, you won't take those medications, and the virus will continue to do its dirty work.

HIV affects people differently. In some people, HIV might lead to AIDS within a few years after they were infected. On the flip side, some people can go 20 years or more without ever developing AIDS. Ten years has been found to be the average amount of time that passes between when a person is infected with HIV and when he or she begins experiencing the symptoms of AIDS.