Sex and prevention concerns
for positive people

September 2002     View PDF     En español

What kinds of infections
can I protect myself from getting?

Prevention isn’t just about protecting someone else from getting HIV; it’s also about protecting yourself from other harmful infections. You can do something about many common and serious infections. The risks of unsafe sex are numerous because many STDs can cause serious harm in people living with HIV.

Cytomegalovirus (CMV) is such a condition. While most adults are infected with CMV, it doesn’t cause disease in healthy, HIV-negative people. Therefore, most people carry the virus but don’t have active CMV disease. However, once CMV becomes an active infection, it’s the leading cause of blindness and among the major causes of death in people with AIDS. Ways to prevent CMV infection include practicing safer sex.

CMV prevention is probably much more relevant to women than to men, particularly adult gay men. The rate of CMV infection among women is generally lower (40% among women living with HIV) than what’s seen among adult gay men (80–90% of whom are already infected with CMV, regardless of HIV status). The bottom line is that if you’re not infected with CMV, safer sex remains a potent tool in helping to prevent CMV disease.

Like CMV, human papilloma virus (HPV) is another STD. HPV is the virus that causes genital warts in some people. These warts may or may not be visible by external examination, yet might be present in the anus or cervix. As one of the major causes of anal and cervical cancer, HPV is common and difficult to treat among people living with HIV. Some types of HPV are more likely to develop into cancer than other types.

Both men and women are at risk for anal cancer associated with HPV. Some studies suggest that a woman living with HIV is more at risk of developing anal cancer as opposed to cervical cancer associated with HPV infection. Unlike other conditions associated with HIV disease, the rate of anal and cervical cancer associated with HPV infection does not appear to be dramatically declining with increased use of anti-HIV therapy. Unfortunately, condom and other barrier protections may not protect you from HPV infection and transmission, but they might decrease the risk of transmission.

Hepatitis, cryptosporidiosis, parasites and other infections can also be passed during sexual activity. Every condition described above can be deadly in anyone living with HIV, especially with a weakened immune system. (For more information, read how to prevent these infections.)

It’s important for people living with HIV to protect themselves from these unwanted and possibly dangerous infections. Lab tests can detect these infections, but your medical coverage may not pay for them. You can ask your doctor about possibly getting these tests. Then, use the results to build a prevention plan that helps protect you from getting new infections.