What are some of the symptoms of HIV infection and AIDS?
Once infected with HIV, a person may or may not experience any symptoms.  People who do experience symptoms might have a flu-like illness within one or two months after infection.  Symptoms can include fever, headache, tiredness and/or enlarged lymph nodes. These symptoms usually disappear within a week to a month and are often mistaken for the symptoms of more common viral infections, like a cold.  More persistent or severe symptoms might not appear for several years after a person is first infected with HIV. This period of "asymptomatic" infection is highly individual. Some people might begin to have symptoms within a few months, while others might be symptom-free for more than 10 years.

As the immune system is weakened by HIV, several complications and symptoms could begin to occur.  These symptoms might be made worse if the HIV-positive person is not getting the care and services they need.  For many people, the first signs of infection are enlarged lymph nodes or "swollen glands" that may be inflamed for several months. As the immune system is weakened by HIV, several complications and symptoms could begin to occur.  These symptoms could be made worse if the HIV-positive person is not getting the care and services they need.  For many people, the first signs of infection are enlarged lymph nodes or "swollen glands" that may be inflamed for several months. Other symptoms that HIV-positive people might experience months to years before receiving an AIDS diagnosis include:

• Lack of energy
• Weight loss
• Frequent fevers and sweats (sometimes known as "night sweats")
• Persistent or frequent yeast infections (oral or vaginal)
• Persistent skin rashes or flaky skin
• Pelvic inflammatory disease in women that does not respond to treatment
• Short-term memory loss
• Frequent and severe herpes infections that cause mouth, genital, or anal sores, or a painful nerve disease called shingles.

Both men and women experience many of the same symptoms from HIV infection. However, women also experience unique complications that are primarily gynecologic. These could include recurrent vaginal yeast infections, severe pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) or human papillomavirus (HPV) infections.  Other vaginal infections might occur more frequently and with greater severity in HIV-positive women (compared with HIV-negative women), including bacterial vaginosis and common sexually transmitted infections such as gonorrhea, chlamydia, and trichomoniasis.  HIV-positive women also might experience disruptions or other irregularities in their menstrual cycles.

The signs and symptoms of HIV/AIDS are similar to the symptoms of many other illnesses. The only way to determine HIV infection is to be tested.

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