What to Know About HIV and AIDS in 2016

The Basics

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is an incurable virus that weakens the immune system by attacking the body's T-cells (a type of white blood cell that helps ward off diseases, bacteria, and viruses). If not aggressively treated, HIV can cause acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).

How You Get It

HIV is not spread as easily as some other STDs. It's transmitted through bodily fluids: semen, pre-ejaculate, rectal fluids, vaginal fluids, blood, and breast milk. However these fluids must come in direct contact with a person's mucous membrane (a layer of skin that lines body openings like the nose or mouth). This is why people often get HIV through unprotected anal, vaginal, or (rarely) oral sex. Unprotected anal sex is particularly risky, especially if you're receiving. It's also possible to spread the virus if one of the fluids comes in contact with damaged tissue (like through a cut or an open sore) or the bloodstream.

You might recall that in the early days of the AIDS epidemic, there was a lot of concern about blood transfusions. But in 1985, they started testing all blood donations for HIV, so any blood you receive at a hospital is safe.

What’s It Like?

The first two to four weeks after being infected, you'll probably feel fluish. Symptoms can range from fever, chills, and fatigue to muscle aches or a sore throat. These will eventually disappear, and you'll enter the clinical latency period—also called chronic HIV infection—during which you may not have any symptoms at all. This stage can last anywhere from 10 years to several decades, depending on whether you're on meds.

The third and final phase is AIDS, which causes more flu-like symptoms—chills, fever, weakness—and weight loss. People with AIDS are also more susceptible to other illnesses because their immune systems are so damaged. Without treatment, they can expect to live about three years.

How Serious Is It?

OK, now that all that scary stuff is out of the way, we can talk about HIV and AIDS in 2016. While HIV is still a very real threat, things have also changed a lot since the 80s and 90s.

"People who have HIV can go on to have normal, healthy sexual relationships," says Yesmean Wahdan, M.D., associate medical director at Bayer Women's Healthcare. "It's just a matter of staying on top of your treatment regimen and having the conversation with your partner about your condition."

People who have HIV can go on to have normal, healthy sexual relationships.

If HIV is caught early and the infected person is started on antiretroviral therapy (ART), their viral load (the amount of HIV in the blood) can become undetectable, making it hard to pass on to another person when practicing safe sex.

What Can I Do?

Practice safe sex, abstain from intravenous drug use, and use pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) if you're at risk of getting HIV.

"The best defense is a good offense," says Sherry Ross, M.D., a women's health expert based in Santa Monica. "Researchers think PrEP could be a public health strategy to control widespread epidemics of common STIs."

PrEP is a combination of two medicines—tenofovir and emtricitabine—that helps block the infection. Taken correctly, it can lower your risk of getting HIV by 90 percent. However, it is not a vaccine, and while it's not 100 percent foolproof, it is light-years ahead of where we were only a few decades ago.

The number of people infected with three major STDs is at an all-time high (yikes!). We're tackling common misconceptions about STIs and STDs to help #ShattertheSTIgma. Because getting tested should be NBD.

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The STI That Almost Disappeared but Is Back in Full Force

The Basics

You might be thinking: No one actually gets syphilis anymore, right? Wrong. While syphilis all but disappeared in the early 2000s, it's been on the rise ever since. In fact, the number of syphilis cases in the U.S. nearly doubled from 2005 to 2013—and was even higher in 2015 (the highest since it's been since the 90s).

The good thing is syphilis can be cured if it's caught early enough. But if you don't get treated, it can cause serious health problems and even death.

How You Get It

You get syphilis by coming into contact with a syphilis sore or rash during vaginal, anal, or oral sex. Though syphilis is much more common in men, in particular gay and bisexual men, women aren't immune. And because syphilis can be spread from a mother to her unborn baby, it's especially important for women to protect themselves and get tested.

What’s It Like?

Syphilis has so many different symptoms that it earned the nickname the "great imitator." This, of course, makes it difficult to pin down.

Syphilis has so many different symptoms that it earned the nickname the 'great imitator.'

The primary stage usually involves a small, painless sore (called a chancre) on your vagina, anus, penis, or scrotum. Most people just get one, making it easy to miss. The sore is extremely contagious but will go away on its own after about three to six weeks. Because syphilis sores disappear, people don't always get tested.

The secondary stage is a little more obvious. Instead of a single sore, you'll get multiples—or a rough, red or brownish rash—on one or more parts of the body. Just like the primary stage, the rash will go away without treatment.

"With this stage of syphilis, the symptoms become more generalized," says Yesmean Wahdan, M.D., the associate medical director of Bayer Women's Healthcare. "Patients will have fever, swollen glands, malaise, sore throat, and visual impairment."

Once that clears up, there's the latent stage—called so because there are no symptoms, sometimes for years. But without treatment, it may return.

Late-stage syphilis, which can happen 10 to 20 years after that initial sore, is more persistent and even less pleasant—but only about 15 percent of people with syphilis actually get to this point.

This is the scary part, when the disease starts to affect your internal organs—the brain, nerves, heart, and joints—and can eventually cause paralysis, gradual blindness, dementia, and death.

How Serious Is It?

Unfortunately, this is a serious one, especially because it's easy to miss or ignore.

What Can I Do?

Talk to your partner and practice safe sex.

"Prevention is the best defense against STIs like syphilis," says Sherry Ross, M.D., a gynecologist based in Santa Monica. "Male and female condoms can help reduce your risk."

But because sores can pop up in places not covered by a condom, protection isn't 100 percent guaranteed.

Luckily, syphilis is easily treated with penicillin. Again, it's important to catch it early, since antibiotics can't reverse any of the damage already done by the disease. If you're getting treated, don't start having sex again until your sores have healed. It's also important to note that getting syphilis once doesn't make you immune; you can get it again.

The number of people infected with three major STDs, including syphilis, is at an all-time high (yikes!). We're tackling common misconceptions about STIs and STDs to help #ShattertheSTIgma. Because getting tested should be NBD.

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1 in 4 People Have HPV, but What Is It Really?

The Basics

The fact is nearly all people who are sexually active will come in contact with the human papillomavirus (HPV) at one point in their lives. After all, it's the most common STI on earth. There are roughly 100 strains of HPV out there, but only about 40 of them infect the genital area—and even fewer are considered serious. ⁰

How You Get It

You can contract HPV through vaginal, anal, or oral sex, and it can even be passed by a person who's asymptomatic (which is pretty common—more on that below). HPV, along with herpes, is one of the few STIs that can bypass the latex barrier of a condom and infect a person through skin-to-skin contact.

"If your partner is a known carrier of HPV and wears a condom, you can still catch this contagious virus," says Sherry Ross, M.D., a gynecologist based in Santa Monica.

What's It Like?

Here’s the tough part about HPV: There are usually no symptoms. At least two types of HPV (types 6 and 11) can cause genital warts (in fact, 90 percent of all genital warts are caused by those strains). But for most of the nearly 80 million people living with the infection, there are no signs.

For most of the nearly 80 million people living with the infection, there are no signs.

How Serious Is It?

Most of the time HPV clears up on its own and doesn't cause any health issues. But if you've seen a Gardasil commercial, you're probably aware of its connection to cancer. Each year HPV causes about 30,700 cases of cancer, more commonly in woman than in men. Cervical cancer is the one that gets the most attention, but other rarer cancers—penile, anal, vaginal—also have strong associations with HPV. For instance, about 5,010 people are diagnosed with anal cancer each year, and about 91 percent of those cases are caused by HPV.

One more thing: The types of HPV that cause genital warts are not cancerous. So though you might not like the way they look, technically, they're less serious.

What Can I Do?

Here's the great news: HPV has a vaccine. Gardasil, which protects against the strains that most commonly cause cancer or genital warts, has been available since 2006. There's also Cervarix and Gardasil-9—both of which protect against even more strains of HPV.

“HPV was not even on the radar for sexually active women and men 30 years ago," Ross says. "Now the HPV vaccine is part of the health care narrative for young girls and boys.”

It's recommended that children ages 11 to 12 get two doses of the vaccine, whereas people who get it later (ages 15 to 26) need the whole three-dose series.

Women between the ages of 21 and 65 should get a Pap test and/or HPV test every three to five years, depending on what your doc recommends.

The number of people infected with three major STDs is at an all-time high (yikes!). We're tackling common misconceptions about STIs and STDs to help #ShattertheSTIgma. Because getting tested should be NBD.

Works Cited

1. Classification of papillomaviruses. de Villiers EM, Fauquet C, Broker TR. Virology, 2004, Jul.;324(1):0042-6822.

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How to Reduce Your Chances of Getting an STI and Still Have a Sex Life

Sex shouldn’t be scary. In fact, when done correctly, it should feel the exact opposite of scary. Still, the threat of getting an STI is enough to make anyone a little gun-shy. (And hey, if you're choosing to not have sex, that's fine too! After all, it's the only foolproof way to prevent pregnancy and STDs.)

But let's get real: You shouldn't let the possibility of getting an STI scare you off from having sex. While some are harder to catch than others, staying safe is mostly a matter of common sense and, well, condoms. Whether you're in a monogamous relationship or dating around, there are a number of steps you can take to keep yourself healthy.

Talk to Your Partner

There’s no government-mandated instruction manual on how to talk about STIs with your partner. It's probably going be awkward. But you know what’s more awkward than asking about gonorrhea? Getting gonorrhea.

“Millennials are more accustomed to using condoms and having the ‘STI conversation’ before jumping into bed,” says Sherry Ross, M.D., a gynecologist and women's health expert based in Santa Monica.

Stay Safe

As we mentioned before, the only way to guarantee you won’t get an STI is to not have sex. But there are options.

"Every day, I counsel women of all ages on the importance of safe-sex practices," Ross says. "The conversation always includes how condoms can help prevent the most common STIs—though it is not a guarantee.”

It's true: Condoms are not an ironclad way to stay safe, especially if you’re using the lambskin kind, which only protect against pregnancy. But chances of staying protected with latex and polyurethane condoms are high (just not perfect).

Proper condom use is great at stopping chlamydia, gonorrhea, trich, and HIV. HPV and herpes, however, are transferred through skin-to-skin contact, so they can both be passed even with if you're using condoms correctly.

“Most men do not have symptoms, and there is not a test to know if men carry HPV,” says Yvonne Bohn, M.D., a gynecologist with over 17 years of experience. “That’s something that separates HPV from harder-to-get STIs like HIV. HPV can be spread easily even with a condom, making protected vaginal, anal, or oral sex just as risky.”

What about other forms of protection? Well, despite what some people think, douching does not protect against STIs. Same goes for urinating after sex, showering, or taking Plan B. A female condom is around 95 percent effective when used correctly (pretty close to the 98 percent success rate of male condoms), so there's no reason to skip safety even if penises aren't involved.

Get Tested

We get how embarrassing it can be to request a test from your doc, but believe us, doctors have seen everything. Some are even working to change the process so that the patient must explicitly say no to getting tested rather than the other way around. Sayonara, uncomfortable questions!

"Some health care providers and some in the CDC are pushing for a more universal approach to chlamydia," says Cherrell Triplett, M.D., an OB/GYN and women's health expert. "So when a patient comes in for her annual exam, you just do a screening if they're in that target population [i.e., under 25 years old]."

But until that becomes the standard, it's on you to ask your health care provider. The CDC and Planned Parenthood recommend getting testing at least once per year, but like most things in the realm of sexuality, it's up to you.

"I leave it to my patient," says Gil Weiss, M.D., an assistant professor of clinical medicine at Northwestern Medical. "But whenever you're finishing a relationship and starting a new relationship, it's not a bad idea to get tested." Same goes for if you suspect you were being cheated on; just be honest with yourself and get tested.

Some STIs are easy to test for: Chlamydia, gonorrhea, and trichomoniasis only require a swab of the genital area or a urine sample. HIV, herpes, and syphilis can be found with a blood test. And a few STIs with visible symptoms—like a herpes outbreak—can occasionally be diagnosed on the spot.

Where to Get Tested

Planned Parenthood is probably the best-known spot, and it’s easy to find a nearby location via its website. A complete guide to free or nearly free testing sites can also be found on the CDC’s website.

Likewise, testing info is usually available on your city’s health department website. NYC, L.A., Chicago, Miami, and Houston, for instance, all offer STD screening services at multiple locations.

Will my parents find out? Will people label me if they know?

Confidentiality goes hand in hand with STI testing.

"If a patient is under their parent’s insurance, sometimes they ask, 'Will my parents find out?' or, 'Will people label me if they know?'" Triplett says.

The reality is: Most of the time no one will know except you, your doc, and (hopefully) your partner, even if you're covered by Obamacare or on your parents' insurance.

That said, laws do vary from state to state. Only one state (Iowa) requires physicians to notify parents if a minor has a positive HIV result. In several states, physicians may inform parents, but they're not required to. And as soon as you're over 18, you're on your own.

If You Have an STI

First, don't freak out. Not every STI diagnosis is the end of the world. STIs do make it easier to contract HIV—and can lead to more serious health complications if left untreated—but many (chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis, for example) are treatable with antibiotics.

HPV is slightly more complicated. Some strains will clear up on their own; others (more rarely) can cause cervical or anal cancer. But the fact is around 80 million Americans are currently infected with HPV, so it's nearly unavoidable. Fortunately there are now multiple vaccines that protect against the strains that commonly cause cancer and genital warts.

HIV, on the other hand, is actually very hard to contract. People used to believe that HIV could be easily contracted through kissing, sharing gum, and getting tattooed, but today we know none of that is true. If you do become infected with the virus—or you're with someone who has it—it's possible to still have a sex life using a combination of condoms and PrEP—a preventive medicine for people at high risk of contracting HIV.

Almost 40 states allow something called expedited partner therapy, which is a way to treat an STI-positive person and their partner, without having to examine the partner. It's currently only allowed for gonorrhea and chlamydia, but it helps.

"If a person is positive, then I can say, put your boyfriend or partner on the line, and I can call in some antibiotics, most of the time, right away," Weiss says. No extra doc appointment, no added embarrassment.

The number of people infected with three major STDs is at an all-time high (yikes!). We're tackling common misconceptions about STIs and STDs to help #ShattertheSTIgma. Because getting tested should be NBD.

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These Hilarious Comics Nail What It's Like to Live With a Disability in 2016

Two sisters are putting a hilarious spin on the crap people with disabilities have to put up with in 2016. Jessica and Lianna Oddi, two illustrators who use wheelchairs, created a blog called The Disabled Life to show what it's actually like to deal with everyday situations (including Tinder) when you have a disability.

"To be honest, it really started as a way to share our personal experiences in a funny way," Jessica told Refinery 29. "But as it continues to grow, our underlying goal is to help make disabilities a common topic. It’s 2016; we can all talk about diversity, share our thoughts, and treat everyone like human beings!" Check out some of the powerful comics below:

All Photos: The Disabled Life

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This Emotional Story Explains Exactly What a Late-Term Abortion Is—and What It Isn't

When Donald Trump talked about late-term abortions in the final presidential debate, the Internet exploded. According to Trump, current abortion law means "you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb of the mother in the ninth month, on the final day." But here's the thing—that's not what happens at all (his description actually sounds more like a violent C-section).

As this emotional Facebook post explains, late-term abortions are performed in severe cases, and they are often very traumatic. We should be listening to OB/GYNs and the women who have gone through late-term abortions, not politicians.

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Matt McGorry Is the Body Image Spokesperson Men Have Needed for Years

Though there's still work to be done, we’re basically living in the golden age of body positivity—for women, at least. But what about men?! Yes, women face a ton of criticism about their bodies, but actor Matt McGorry (Orange Is the New Black, How to Get Away With Murder) recently opened up about how much it affects guys too.

McGorry used to be a competitive bodybuilder, which actually made him more critical of his body. He told TODAY he was miserable while training, but being OK with how his body looked when he wasn't super muscular wasn't easy. McGorry even admits to slipping back into old crash-dieting habits before his first shirtless shoot for Orange Is the New Black. And he says he's still working on not being too self-critical.

McGorry has a lot to say about gender and body image, so we’ll let you hear it from him:

I hope that discussions of body issues and self-criticism will become more of a conversation among men. I really do think that tied in those issues—and our willingness (or lack thereof) to discuss them—is a conversation of how vulnerable men are willing to be in general. We're taught, typically, that a real man doesn't show vulnerability, nor does he exhibit self-conscious behaviors.

But in my experience, being public about things like that leads to great freedom. It's the first step. If we can't express it, it's hard to change how we think and feel about it.

When we lock our boys away from those feelings, not only are they more likely to hurt themselves, [but] they're more likely to hurt others and to hurt women. They'll likely be the ones policing masculinity among other men too.

It's time to get away from the idea that men are supposed to be strong and hard and unfeeling, and women are soft and maternal. Gender is a spectrum, not a binary system, and it's time we view our behaviors, emotions, and appearances on a spectrum as well. Many men are vulnerable to unhealthy, powerless feelings when it comes to body image. Let's talk about it.

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