• Each year, more than 50,000 Americans become infected with HIV.
• Since the beginning of the AIDS epidemic, more than 620,000 people have died from the virus in the United States alone, with the majority of them being gay and bisexual men.
• A person gets infected with HIV every nine minutes in the United States.
• If seen through the lens of ethnicity and race, it's the African American population that has been the most affected by HIV. In the year 2010, African Americans made up 12% of the total US population but accounted for more than 44% of the population suffering from new HIV infections.

Anqa/Pixabay. Having unprotected sex is the most common cause of HIV.

• With the ongoing rate of the AIDS spread, it is estimated that at any point in their life, 1 in 16 African American men and 1 in 32 African American women will contract HIV infection.
• The main causes of the HIV epidemic spreading are:

1) having unprotected sexual intercourse ( oral, vaginal, or anal) with a person who has HIV.

2) sharing syringes

3) being born to an HIV-positive mother

4) the virus transferring through blood transfusion.

• HIV damages the body by wreaking havoc on a specific kind of blood cell, called CD4+T cells. These blood cells help the body fight diseases and strengthen the immune system.
• A person cannot contract HIV through touching or hugging a person suffering from AIDS. Sharing utensils and cups, sharing bathrooms and pools, and touching things that have been in contact with the infected person is totally harmless since the virus cannot survive on surfaces.

PublicDomainPictures/Pixabay. Sharing syringes and injections also spread the AIDS virus.

• The HIV infection can survive in cold temperatures, but is sensitive to hot temperatures. As per experiments conducted by scientists, the virus can be killed in temperatures above 60 C.
• HIV infection can survive in dried blood form for upto six days at room temperature. In the wet form, such as in syringes or injections, it can survive for weeks at room temperature.

Volodymyr Hryshchenko/Unsplash. HIV and AIDS exhibit themselves in a number of different diseases, like lung issues, tumors, and dementia.

• People suffering from AIDS are highly vulnerable to AIDS-defining diseases. The most common diseases these patients have are:

1) Kaposi's sarcoma which exhibits itself in the form of purple blotches on the skin and around the mouth

2) headaches by tumors

3) fungal infections in the spine or brain

4) malnutrition

5) lung infections causing breathing issues

6) diarrhea

7) dementia

• Globally, more women than men contract HIV. They are more likely to be HIV positive and are more affected by the virus as they are highly likely to care for and support other HIV patients too.