It slowly weakens the body's ability to fight off illness. People with AIDS can have serious infections and cancers. These illnesses make them very sick and can eventually kill them. HIV spreads through blood, semen and vaginal secretions from infected people. People get HIV from contact with these fluids.
Contact can come from unsafe sex.
It can also come from used needles and syringes. Infected women can pass the virus to their babies during pregnancy, childbirth and breast feeding. Some people who received blood products from 1978 to 1985 got infected blood. Now blood tanks test all blood for HIV before they use it. Avoid unsafe sex.