Introduction These guidelines were adopted by IU Board of Trustees, 1986. Questions and concerns should be addressed to the campus human resources department. This defect renders the host susceptible to certain life-threatening infections or malignant processes. Many infected individuals apparently remain symptom free. The virus, HTLV III is a weak infectious agent.
Infection results only from contamination of the host s blood stream with infected secretions.
Current information suggests that this can occur during sex, birth, when contaminated blood products are transfused or when using a contaminated needle. The same current information suggests that transmission does not occur from respiratory droplets, as in coughing and sneezing, or from food, environmental objects or insects. A blood test for antibodies to the HTLV III virus is available. Confirmation of true positives is expensive and slow. Because of the potential for false positive results and concern for individual liberties, the test should not be used for routine screening except to protect the donated blood supply.