Would you date someone who was HIV positive?

[IAmThe1AndOnly]

My late BIL and his DP were/are both HIV positive. BIL died five years ago of an unrelated illness, and his DP has been moving forward with his life. TBH I haven’t really seen him since BIL died, but I do have him on FB.

So the other day he posted that he was gutted because he’d met someone he liked, and as soon as he told him about his HIV status the guy had blocked him.

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And the vitriol directed towards this bloke had to be seen to be believed. Everything from calling him all manner of names, to saying he was a bigot, discriminatory, how dare anyone refuse to go out with someone who is HIV positive. Don’t they know that it’s not a death sentence any more? And so on.

I do agree that blocking him seems a bit harsh. After all why not just say that he didn’t want to date someone with HIV.

But doesn’t not wanting to date someone HIV positive just sit within “you can choose not to date someone for any reason you like,” including people with kids for instance?

I didn’t dare add my comment or I have no doubt they would have turned on me as well.

But is it wrong to feel that way?

It is not about optimism it is about fact. The people with HIV that I know adhere to their regimens because they don't want to develop AIDS and, you know, go on to possibly die.

I am guessing you don't know anyone who is HIV+.

Sorry to say I wouldn't.

I believe there are online dating sites specifically for people with hiv though so I would gently suggest that it might be a good idea for him to meet someone that way.

I think for most people with HIV you are correct. But most isn’t all and people do some really fucked up things (especially when relationships go bad).

No I wouldn’t. I’m in good health and I enjoy being in good health. It would be a no from me.

I think anyone is entitled to refuse to date anyone for any reason. But I guess maybe the counter to that is that anyone can also judge anyone else for any reason.

So, no one has to date someone with HIV, but I think that is probably fairly indicative of some of your values, and expresses how you feel about the condition and as such it's also probably reasonable for others to judge you on that, esp if they are part of a community disproportionately affected by HIV and with a massive history of stigma and exclusion based on it.

Like Thomas: Former Wales rugby star settles HIV case with ex www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-64453783 Gareth Thomas you mean?

And how many people could his former partner have infected if he’d not found that tablet and gone looking. I highly doubt that GT would have told him if he hadn’t come across those drugs.

But yeah. everyone with HIV takes precautions. Except wen they don’t.

I would, but then there would have to be the trust there to start with about them taking medication etc. I am aware that treatments have come on leaps and bounds now, and it is no longer a death sentence.

Saying that, anyone can refuse to date someone else for whatever reason. But the blocking does seem a bit extreme.

Cases like that are very, very rare.

If we fitted in every other way, yes i would, as with the right drugs, transmission is off the table.

Would i date someone with oral or genital herpes? No, i would not. It comes down to the fact that i could be protected from ever "catching" the HIV, but there aren't the same medications to prevent the "catching" of herpes, and that can be really dangerous. Ok, they can take anti virals to reduce the load, but those often are not prescribed long term, and there's always a risk that they're contageous before they realise they have an outbreak coming on.

Blocking was a bit harsh, BUT they were probably doing it to protect themself from potential backlash. He had no idea if he would take the rejection politely and understanding, or lash out, and the fact some people have reacted badly, it seems he was right to be worried.

Absolutely everyone has the right to not want to date someone for whatever reason they want, and that should be respected.

Also, that was not a criminal case, so Thomas was not found guilty of anything, nor did he admit liability.

That's incorrect. A woman's risk is estimated to be far lower. But of course, you could still become infected after one exposure.

Risk of Exposure to HIV/AIDS | Stanford Health Care

I grew up in the era where I knew of one woman who died of AIDS and another who killed herself, and many dozens of gay males who died of AIDS.

You are incorrect.

I said via heterosexual sex. The screenshot is from the study you linked. Women are twice as likely to get it.

• Receptive anal sex carries a much higher risk of HIV infection than receptive vaginal sex. Research shows that the risk of HIV transmission from receptive anal sex is up to 18 times higher than from receptive vaginal sex.

From that study. I think that makes it pretty clear.

Oh, and by the way, I didn't hear about it at school. My friends fucking died. Beautiful young men.

There were still 630,000 people who died last year of Aids. Many possibly wouldn't have access to treatment but some also become drug resistant. It's not a risk I'd ever knowingly take.

People also lie. My friends partner deliberately exposed her. She had no idea he was positive. She found out he wasn't taking his meds and it was possible for him to transmit the virus. He's back on tinder and other apps but the police won't do anything until someone tests positive.

You're deliberately ignoring what I wrote; if you don't know what heterosexual sex is I can't help you.

Also, I never said I only learned about these things in school. You shouldn't have assumed that.

What are you banging on about? You can't read clearly presented facts.

Thanks for your sympathy for the decimation of my friends and colleagues.

Your wrote: "The resulting sex ed classes at school meant to help us, and surely did save lives, but gave my generation some pretty extreme health anxiety around sex."

You alsor wrote: "Physically speaking, women are much more at risk than men to getting HIV via heterosexual sex because it's transmitted via fluids."

This is scatty understanding. There needs to be a cut or abrasian (more common in anal sex) for women to pick it up via PIV sex.

Oh that makes it alright then. Silly me.

Prince Andrew was never found guilty of anything either, and he too settled out of court. So I guess people should just lay off him as well then. Nope, thought not.

PrEP has become a gamechanger...

I don’t think this would be a relationship-ender for me (eg. Ten years in and husband caught it via non cheating methods). However, I am not desperate for a partner, have my own (non-transmissible) chronic health conditions and in the beginning of a relationship it would have to be someone truly special that I would consider it worth the risk to my own health. I would break up with someone who concealed it from me or misled me.
I think the man who blocked your friend either didn’t see the relationship as worth the risk or perhaps was upset that he had been lied to (by omission) and felt deceived. The trust was gone so the relationship was over.

Nobody owes anybody a relationship. I have broken up with someone who had no table manners and listening to them chew was off putting. To the PP, no, I wouldn’t date a Muslim. I wouldn’t date a Mormon or any religious believer as I am an atheist and we wouldn’t be compatible. I wouldn’t date someone with active herpes. I wouldn’t date someone who had fathered children with multiple different women. I wouldn’t date someone who had cheated in past relationships. I wouldn’t date someone who (for no legitimate reason) chose not to drive. Everybody has deal breakers, just like I’m sure there are people out there who wouldn’t date me because of x, y and z reasons.

I can understand your friend feeling hurt, however, he is unreasonable to not expect his HIV status to be a deterrent to some (not all!) people.

No, I wouldn’t. People can be lax with medications (even life saving ones), and/or develop drug resistance. It may be rare but it does happen, and that’s a level of risk I wouldn’t be willing to take. When dating single parents and religious men were also a hard pass, as were fat men, men with bad teeth, and men that weren’t on an equal financial footing to me.

People can be as ‘prejudiced’ and as judgemental as they like when it comes to dating. It’s not an equal opportunity endeavour.

I wouldn't either. There are a load of things that would make me avoid a relationship. Some are controversial, others not so much. But that's my choice and I would never be told who I must date based on someone else's opinion.

Unfortunately, love hurts. Being defensive and aggressive towards it is absolutely not the right way to approach it. I suspect it's easier for him to shout about it than to accept the situation and that it WILL put some people off.

You seem very angry towards me. I am not sure why. I was just pointing out the facts of the case. Neither of us know the true story.

No not angry, but your implication seems to be that because he wasn’t found guilty of anything then clearly it wasn’t an issue. But the reason he wasn’t found guilty was because he paid off the man he infected, whether that be knowingly or through his own carelessness.

We all know that HIV doesn’t have to be a death sentence. But it still is a life altering illness. And people do still die from AIDS, and the HIV transmission rate is rising not falling. And that has nothing to do with people not wanting to date people with HIV.

Fact is that when you first start dating someone you don’t know anything about them. You have no idea whether they can be trusted or not.

One of the victims of the blood scandal is a man whose father contracted the virus due to treatment for haemophilia. He passed the virus to his wife (thus eliminating the theory that it can’t be passed on through PIV sex), who passed it to her baby daughter, who died when she was four months old. And both parents then died within the next two years.

And while the death rate from HIV is no longer on that scale, if care isn’t taken, then infection possibility is still there.

It only takes one partner in a string of partners to not tell someone they are HIV positive to start a chain of infections.

And hear people do exist, whether it’s rare or not is entirely irrelevant. One is one too many, and fact is that going into a relationship you have no idea of how diligent someone is with their drugs regime.