What are Causative Agents and Diseases of AIDs?

What are the causative agents and diseases of AIDS? The causative agent of AIDS is HIV and there are many different diseases that can result from AIDs.

Human Immunodeficiency Virus, known as HIV, is a retrovirus generally believed to be the causative agent for AIDS. HIV is a tricky virus to diagnose and treat, due to the fact that there are actually two forms of it:

• HIV-1 is the most common form, and is also stronger.
• HIV-2 is found in limited areas, mostly in western Africa, and is less potent – but no less alarming.

In order to understand how HIV leads to AIDS, it’s important to understand how a retrovirus works. A virus, in general terms, is anything that invades cells and uses them for its own survival; a retrovirus simply refers to the genetic material of the virus (a retrovirus has RNA versus DNA).

The actual process of infection is as follows:

• The virus is introduced to the body (most common causes are sexual intercourse, direct contact with infected blood, or from mother to child such as through breast milk)
• The virus attaches itself to certain cells, called CD4+T, which have a weakness in them that makes it easy for HIV to enter. The CD4+T cells are part of the human immune system.
• The virus multiples using the CD4+T cells for its own purposes, killing the cells in the process. This leads to a weakened immune system that puts the infected person at serious risk for diseases.

How HIV Causes AIDS

AIDS is simply a severe manifestation of the HIV virus, which is the causative agent of AIDS; the term is used when HIV has grown in strength and has either caused 24 other diseases to occur in the patient, or when the patient has 200 or fewer CD4+T cells left.

Diseases of AIDS

The most common diseases that inflict people with HIV or AIDS are referred to as opportunistic diseases, meaning they can only infect people with lowered immunity. That makes these diseases quite prevalent among HIV patients.

While there are virtually unlimited diseases that can attack a patient, a few of the most often diagnosed are listed below.

• Progressive Multifocal Leukoencephalopathy affects the nervous system, destroying the protective covering of the system cells and exposing the nerves to damage.
• Liver disease is one of the most common causes of death for AIDS patients. Ironically, liver disease may also be caused by some of the medication used to treat HIV and AIDS.
• Candidiasis is a fungal infection that can occur anywhere on the body, but is typically found in the mouth or on the genitals. If a person is not aware of the AIDS virus in his or her system, but develops candidiasis in their lungs or esophagus, it is a sure sign that AIDS is present.
• Toxoplasmosis affects the brain and occurs when a parasite infects the organ. It can affect the eyes as well as the brain functioning, and often occurs when CD4+T cells are very low in number.

Each of these illnesses are just some of the examples of the diseases of AIDs.