Viral load

[MrFrost]

I was wondering how long does it take when a top stop taking his meds to when he can infect someone?

[wood]

There is no easy answer to this, for some people they may have a detectable viral load in a matter of weeks for other people it could be years.  The viral load is also a main indicator of how infectious the person is, and again, that will vary from person to person 

[MrFrost]

Thank you for the reply

[Chaser93]

Sorry if this is a repeat question, but does anyone know the average time it would take someone currently undetectable stopping their meds to become detectable and able to transmit HIV again? 

[BootmanLA]

17 hours ago, Chaser93 said:

Sorry if this is a repeat question, but does anyone know the average time it would take someone currently undetectable stopping their meds to become detectable and able to transmit HIV again? 

There's not a lot of research on this because generally speaking, having people stop medications that are working to manage a chronic condition just to measure when that condition becomes problematic is pretty unethical. Especially when doing so can eventually lead to the condition becoming unmanageable at all.

But in general, based on what people who report deliberately quit taking meds and who get tested have experienced, a person can become "detectable" ( within a month. That doesn't mean the person can transmit HIV; "undetectable" used to mean less than 200 copies of the virus per ml of blood (at which point transmission is essentially impossible), but "undetectable" now means less than 25 copies per ml. As a result, one's viral load could grow from below 25 to 200 - an eightfold increase - and still be mostly incapable of transmitting HIV.

Moreover, even at just over 200, that doesn't mean infection of another person is likely. It's not that the human body can't fight HIV on its own, to some degree - it can. The problem is that HIV has the ability to infect cells that the human immune system can't eradicate - essentially, its own immunity factories inside the body - and so those cells keep replicating HIV over and over and over, and the immune system can't stop that process.

As long as a potential HIV infection is cleared before it infects those cells where the immune system can't fight it, the person is unlikely to contract HIV. That's why high VL individuals are more likely to infect someone (because the level of virus is too much for the body's normal immune response to tackle completely before it reaches, essentially, permanent status in the person's system).

It would take longer for someone who quits meds, then, to have a good chance of infecting someone else, because it will take some time (again, not something that ethically science could test and measure) for the VL to reach that point.

[OregonReCharge]

It’s been about a year since I’ve been off meds, and I just now have a viral load that’s detectable but viral load is still less than 100.

[BootmanLA]

12 minutes ago, OregonReCharge said:

It’s been about a year since I’ve been off meds, and I just now have a viral load that’s detectable but viral load is still less than 100.

If you don't mind the question - were you tested regularly and caught the infection early (and went on meds soon after)?

[OregonReCharge]

2 hours ago, BootmanLA said:

If you don't mind the question - were you tested regularly and caught the infection early (and went on meds soon after)?

I don’t mind at all. I wasn’t tested regularly but knew that, by my actions and experiencing the symptoms of seroconversion, I was likely infected. I started on meds about 2 months later.

[BootmanLA]

59 minutes ago, OregonReCharge said:

I don’t mind at all. I wasn’t tested regularly but knew that, by my actions and experiencing the symptoms of seroconversion, I was likely infected. I started on meds about 2 months later.

Then that makes some sense - it's likely your body never had to fight the actual infection itself for very long, meaning your immune system was probably pretty strong - so when you went off meds, it was able to keep your viral load low for an extended period. 

[Marlin]

[Cumpigmelb]

If I go off my meds for up to 4 months would I have any issues going back on the same meds? 
or will the virus have developed an immunity to that med. 

[BootmanLA]

On 10/3/2024 at 8:25 PM, Cumpigmelb said:

If I go off my meds for up to 4 months would I have any issues going back on the same meds? 
or will the virus have developed an immunity to that med. 

It should not have developed a resistance (the proper term) to that particular med simply by being "off" the med. It's possible, but it's not inevitable.

It's much more of a problem to be irregular about the medication - taking it for a few days, skipping a few doses, taking it again. 

Now - if you go off for 4 months and then re-start, even if the same med is effective, it may take a good while (as in a few months) to bring your VL down to an undetectable range again. And there IS a chance - again, not a great chance, but...  - that the medication will be ineffective, or less effective, than it was before.

*Fortunately*, there are several good medications out there, and if it turns out you HAVE become resistant to one, there's a good chance another will work. 

[PozBearWI]

Indeed and thanks @BootmanLA.  By agreement with my HIV doc I am not medicated.  But I'll get a good cadence of labs going and we'll see how this progresses.  I am at a point in life where fretting potential side effects 30 years from now makes no sense.  And my genetics are doing a pretty good job of managing.  I am not far above the "undetectable" line.  And I prefer to play with guys who are equally well informed about risks and how HIV works.  

[Cumpigmelb]

20 hours ago, BootmanLA said:

It should not have developed a resistance (the proper term) to that particular med simply by being "off" the med. It's possible, but it's not inevitable.

It's much more of a problem to be irregular about the medication - taking it for a few days, skipping a few doses, taking it again. 

Now - if you go off for 4 months and then re-start, even if the same med is effective, it may take a good while (as in a few months) to bring your VL down to an undetectable range again. And there IS a chance - again, not a great chance, but...  - that the medication will be ineffective, or less effective, than it was before.

*Fortunately*, there are several good medications out there, and if it turns out you HAVE become resistant to one, there's a good chance another will work. 

I contracted HIV on 30th Nov 2023 

by 23 Feb 2024 my VL was 403,000 they were concerned it was a very strong virus   

my Tcells were good 

 

[Erik62]

On 8/22/2017 at 4:47 PM, MrFrost said:

I was wondering how long does it take when a top stop taking his meds to when he can infect someone?

Every poz person will be different. The higher your VL & TCells, the more likely you will pass on your poz status. This is because a very healthy, sportsman poz person will have a slower rise in their VL & TCells, which determine just how infectious you are, than will a person that has chronic health problems, lower immune responses, drug addiction, alcoholism, a person who is slack with taking meds or even someone who just fails to look after their diet & exercise. 

Hope this helps🤔🤔.