You can answer a few questions to discover your HIV status. You don't have to reveal your identity.

You can get your HIV tested at any of your nearest health care center or hospital. You can find the list of such testing centers in this website under Booking an Appointment service. You can also contact the nearest Health Information and Service Center (HISC) for important counseling and advice on HIV.

You can get HIV regardless of your race, ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation if you engage in unsafe sex or come in contact with blood of the HIV infected person. Risky behaviors like having unprotected sex or sharing needles while using drugs are common ways to get HIV. However, people who are gay or bisexual have more chances of getting HIV. For example, men having sex with men (MSM) are mostly affected by HIV.

Within 2 to 4 weeks after a person becomes infected with HIV, they may have flu-like symptoms, such as fever, chills, or rash. The symptoms may last for a few weeks after they become infected. More severe symptoms of HIV infection, such as signs of opportunistic infections, generally don’t appear for many years. When the HIV virus starts to weakens our immune system, symptoms like weight loss, fever, diarrhoea, swollen lymph-nodes, etc. are shown. Without treatment, HIV infection usually advances to AIDS in 10 years or longer, though it may take less time for some people. At this stage severe illnesses such as tuberculosis (TB), cryptococcal meningitis, severe bacterial infections, and cancers such as lymphomas and Kaposi’s sarcoma.

You can get HIV if you come in contact with infected bodily fluids like blood, semen, breastmilk and anal or vaginal secretion. This happens when you have unprotected sex with someone who has HIV. Mothers can also pass on virus to their children during the pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding. HIV can be also transmitted through needle sharing while injecting drugs or tattooing. You can also get HIV through contaminated blood transfusion.

HIV stands for human immunodeficiency virus. Meaning, this virus attacks our immune system making us so weak to fight off any infection or disease. If HIV infection is not managed through medication, then it will lead you to have AIDS – acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, which is the last stage of HIV infection and could be life-threatening.

If you think you have engaged in an unprotected sex with multiple partners then you must test for HIV. If you are experiencing symptoms from your risky sexual behaviors like pain or burning while peeing, itchy rashes and vaginal discharge, then you must visit your nearest health care center or hospital to test for HIV or STI’s (sexually transmitted infections).

When in doubt, get tested

However, if you are one of the injection drug users (IDUs) then you should regularly test for HIV, like once in every three months. Pregnant women are tested twice for HIV during their entire pregnancy check-ups.