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Comment by kelnos | Hacker News Reader

That may have been true decades ago, but is no longer the case. Of course nothing is risk-free, but current drugs can get HIV viral loads down to undetectable levels, and if your drug treatment is successful, it's considered reasonably safe for you to swap fluids with others (with their knowledge of your medical history, and consent, of course), as well as become pregnant. Sexual partners should be on PrEP too, to further reduce the risk.

This isn't "living a normal life" completely, and the retrovirals have side effects and the regimen needs to be maintained, but the state of things for people with HIV is so much better than it was back in the 90s.

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I don’t know why you are getting downvoted but I’m guessing that a lot of people don’t know about/understand that undetectable = untransmittable. It is generally seen as safe to have unprotected sex with someone whose viral load is suppressed to the point of being undetectable. Of course you need to believe that’s the case, informed consent is still important, and it’s probably a good idea for the negative party to be on prep, but the fact that the likelihood of transmission is so low if someone is undetectable is widely accepted in medicine and widely known in the LGBTQ+ community at this point.

Just because your condition has catastrophic consequences, particularly if not _properly_ managed, doesn't mean you have to live your life in a catastrophic way.

Pretending that should be ignored benefits no one.

Not quite, the proper course of action is that both you AND your partner take drugs to prevent transmission

Antiretrovirals have significant risks and adverse effects. Uninfected people don't take antiretrovirals unless they have been exposed to the virus. They protect against exposure instead.

The chance of both condoms and antiretroviral therapy failing to prevent transmission simultaneously is always going to be lower than the chance of either failing independently. In practice, many couples decide that the risk of transmission associated with antiretroviral therapy is low enough for them.

Yes you’re right. I was wrong. I confused it with the case where you both have HIV since they can be different strains.

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