What is AIDS and how is it spread? Around the world, AIDS has been a top killer for many people throughout the 20th century and is spread numerous ways. Scientist have been hard at work for years to find a cure for AIDS, but only have been able to find ways to treat it.
             AIDS, which stands for Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, is a human viral disease that corrupts the immune system, shutting down the body's ability to defend itself from infection and disease. Caused by the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), AIDS leaves an infected person subject able to infections. Most infections are harmless in healthy people, but people with AIDS can dies from those same infections. "There is no cure for AIDS, but there are drugs available to prolong life spans and improve the quality of infected people."(Encyclopedia Britannica) Someone who is infected with HIV doesn't always have AIDS, as the deadly disease sometimes takes 10 or more years to escalate to that life threatening stage.
             The most common way to contact and spread HIV is by having sex with an infected person. Genital, Anal, and Oral sex all put you at risk of catching HIV. The virus is in the infected person's vaginal fluids and semen. It makes it's way into the bloodstream by passing through openings in the mucous membrane, which is the tissue that covers the inside of the mouth, vagina, and rectum. "HIV is most commonly transmitted through homosexual men in the United States and Canada."(Encyclopedia Britannica) HIV amongst heterosexual men and women is increasing as the years go on. In other parts of the world, HIV is mostly transmitted through heterosexual sex.
             "HIV can also be spread from a mother to a baby while still in the women's uterus or during childbirth."(Adams, Jad.) HIV can be spread through the mother's breast milk as well. Mother-to-child transmission makes up for almost 90 percent of all...