Table of Contents
Is HIV treatment life long?
Growing Older with HIV Today, thanks to improvements in the effectiveness of treatment with HIV medicine (called antiretroviral therapy or ART), people with HIV who are diagnosed early and who get and stay on ART can keep the virus suppressed and live long and healthy lives.
Do you have to take HIV medication for life?
Yes. ART is not a cure and the virus remains in your body, even if your viral load is undetectable. So you need to keep taking your HIV medicine as prescribed. If you stop taking your HIV medicine, your viral load will quickly go back up.
Can HIV be treated forever?
There is no cure for HIV, but you can control it with HIV treatment.
How long does HIV last after treatment?
For people with HIV, if you have been taking effective HIV treatment and your viral load has been undetectable for 6 months or more, it means you cannot pass the virus on through sex. This is called undetectable=untransmittable (U=U).
Can you sleep with an infected person on ARV?
People living with HIV who take antiretroviral medications daily as prescribed and who achieve and then maintain an undetectable viral load have effectively no risk of sexually transmitting the virus to an HIV-negative partner.