What happens to your body when you're dying from AIDS?

Answer 1

• AIDS stands for 'Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome and is a weakening of the immune system. It is not hereditary, but develops after birth from contact with a disease causing agent such as HIV. It can be caught by bodily fluids, sexual contact with a person with HIV, mother's with AIDS breast feeding, etc. Because the immune system weakens in time (differs in each individual and some can die sooner than others) a series of other complications of organs, etc., are involved. Lung infections; skin cancer (lesions); infections of the eyes and a fungal infection that can cause thrush (a white film in the mouth) and also infections in your throat or vagina. Symptoms are: Serious weight loss; brain tumors; loss of appetite; decreased oral fluid intake and decreased thirst; increasing weakness and fatigue; decreased blood perfusion; decreased urine output and poor blood flow often leaving the patient feeling extremely cold. It can also cause delirium; lethargy; coma (in some patients); and changes in respiratory patterns. Loss of ability to close the eyes; noisy breathing or pharyngeal muscles relax and also can cause hallucinations, delirium, myoclonic jerks and seizures prior to death. The body's immune system breaks down more and more thus opening up for the body for virus', colds and other diseases as well as the shutting-down of organs as the immune system becomes weak and can no longer fight back. Important: Many people with HIV/AIDS can live a long while and the life expectancy is getting longer. One day there will be a cure so one has to try and keep their faith and believe that they still have hope to survive. It is also important to realize that Wills should be in order also a Living Will expressing one's desire as to how they should be treated if they should go into a coma or cannot speak for themselves. There is also pain medications that are often given to the patients that will alleviate a great deal of the pain when the person is coming close to the end of their life.

Answer 2

I am speaking from my knowledge as a social worker, and not as a physician. The main problem with HIV is that it devastates the body's immune system; it is not the direct action of the virus itself that kills. A person can be healthy even with a very low white blood cell count. The problem is that with a compromised immune system, the body is by definition more vulnerable to many illnesses that otherwise would be no problem, or at worst a minor problem. These illnesses or diseases are called opportunistic; they have the "opportunity" to take hold and thrive, and so they do. It is the opportunistic disease that ends up being fatal. So the immediate cause of death can be very different from one person to another who has succumbed to AIDS.

Answer 3

It depends on where you live and what treatments you have access to. If you live in the developed world and have access to antiretroviral therapies then you can live for much longer than if you don't.

If you are diagnosed, in the West, at 20 and put straight on medication you can expect to live for another 30 or 40 years before the illness becomes a threat to your life. Some reports even claim that HIV no longer reduces expected life span at all thanks to medication.

Unfortunately this medication is not routinely available in every country, and some places, like Africa, have seen average life expectancies plummet because of the number of AIDS related deaths that skew the statistics. It's worth pointing out that AIDS itself doesn't kill you, rather the fact that you have an Auto Immune Deficiency Syndrome means that your body loses the ability to fight off other infections, like pneumonia, bronchitis etc, that then become so powerful you die from them.

I'm sorry if this doesn't answer your question neatly, but it's not a neat illness.