It once was thought that HIV, the virus that cause AIDS, was inactive for a time after it first entered the body. However, recent studies using new methods of measuring the amount of HIV in the blood have shown that the virus is active in your body from the moment of infection.

Other studies have shown that HIV reproduces and spreads very quickly. This is important because each time the virus reproduces, it has an opportunity to change, or mutate, in a way that makes it resistant to the drugs currently used to fight it.

Health care professionals have used these findings in an attempt to come up with better treatment options. There is a wider variety of effective treatment options for managing the virus today than ever before.

How the body attacks HIV: HIV works by attacking a certain type of white blood cells called the `helper' T cell, or CD4 cell. It is called a helper cell because it helps other cells in the immune system work properly.

As millions of CD4 cells are destroyed each day, the body frantically tries to keep up with destruction by producing more and more CD4 cells. But the body can't keep this up for ever. Eventually, the number of CD4 cells falls below the amount needed to successfully fight infection. This is when the body begins to fall prey to infections that most HIV-negative people can fight off.

Today, there are new treatment options that can prevent the virus from replicating and help the immune system to work better.

Measuring HIV disease: The T-cell count has been used for several years as a way of measuring the progress of HIV disease. If refers to the number of CD4 cells found in the blood. This count is a measure of how well the body is fighting the virus. A healthy person has 800 to 1,200 CD4 cells per cubic millimetre of blood. As the disease progresses, the number of CD4 cells decreases.

A new way of monitoring HIV disease measures the amount of virus in the blood.

The amount of virus is referred to as viral load. As the disease progresses, the viral load increases. New treatments are designed to keep the viral load as low as possible for as long as possible.

Doctors may use both CD cell counts and viral load counts to monitor your disease.

Once you are put on drug treatment, you may be required to stay on the drugs for a long time. It can be difficult to keep taking pills and watching your diet, particularly if the drugs have side effects. However, it is important that you stick with your treatment programme until your doctor changes it.

Since HIV reproduces quickly, even a short `holiday' might allow the virus to come back up to high levels.

Stopping medication, even briefly, increases the chances that the virus will develop resistance to the drugs.

Managing side effects: You should tell your health care professional about any changes in your health. Sometimes these changes are caused by your treatment regimen. It is important to prepare for side effects, which can include headache, nausea, fatigue, diarrhoea and rash. If your side effects can't be managed, your doctor can tell you about other treatment options.

We now know there are many things you can do to treat HIV. A good diet, commitment to exercise, and healthy living are important steps to help you.

New treatment approaches also are producing results never seen before. While there is no cure yet, doctors are recommending that patients start treatment early in the course of disease and use two or three drugs at a time.

Gaylia Landry Department of Health Source: National Minority AIDS Council, Washington, D.C.