The following page is intended as a basic glossary to learn about terminology concerning HIV or AIDS, and related misconceptions that are still present in public mind when reading or talking about this infection.
Providing this resource, our intention is to ensure people correctly understand all words used in this blog, although we strongly urge to contact local or national HIV and AIDS communities for any medical or psychological issues regarding life with the virus.
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Letter B
Bug chaser
Bug chasing is a very isolated subculture, mostly in gay community, where a person intentionally seeks sexual activity with someone living with HIV who knowingly avoid anti-viral treatmens so that their virus can replicate and transmit. Or, simply, they just have random anonymous encounters with complete strangers whose status is uncertain.
Most bug chasers are just fantasies for adult-only websites but for the very few real cases, there are several hypotheses about the reasons for this fortunately very infrequent behavior.
The most widely shared assumption is a misrepresented concept of sex liberation: once HIV positive, they believe to set themselves free from anxiety or stress related to infection danger.
But overall, deliberately “chasing” HIV, looks like a way to have fate under your own control: “if society assumes I’d end up like this, let me decide when and who gives it to me.”
Moreover, the widespread stigma against gay community and people living with HIV, causes a distorted sense of belonging in some people; an illusion to be unconditionally accepted by a large community.
… it is the only fraternity… I’ve ever rushed that let me in.
Quote from “An Early Frost”, 1985 movie.
We would like to remark that if there was less discrimination and paternalistic attitude toward sexuality, there would be less fear of judgment and certain situations would never arise.
Authors’ note:
We write stories about a fake “Positive (Poz) Brotherhood” but we firmly oppose to any acts of irresponsibility or self-harm.
Sex education can’t be learned from porn, let alone from satirical sites; we simply try inviting people to be aware against HIV stigma, but we have no skill for educating people about sexuality and affectivity.
Letter C
Conversion
Seroconversion, or simply “conversion”, is the word indicating some flu-like symptoms which may appear 10 or 14 days after HIV has entered a human’s body.
Some communities have a jargon term for it, “fuck flu” because sex is HIV’s main spreading cause.
However, not every patient experiences symptoms so these cannot be automatically associated to a seroconversion or, on the contrary, developing no signs doesn’t mean to be certainly HIV negative.
During seroconversion, the viral load (virus quantity in blood) is the highest, increasing possibilities to pass infection on to others. So, only way to ensure to be safe, is get tested for HIV and, in case of positivity, start treatment as soon as possible.
In our site’s fictional stories, “fuck flu” is called “upgrade fever” and it’s a very important rite of passage for any soon-to-be positive individual.
Letter G
Gifter
For the Bug Chasing subculture “gifter” (or “gift giver”) is the “donor” whose duty is skipping anti-viral treatment, so that the virus stays active and can be passed on to someone asking for it.
In order to avoid further homophobia and stigma against people with HIV, let us make a necessary clarification: although the Internet is apparently full of people glorifying their gift giving and bug chasing actions, intentional infection is a good 99% a fantasy shared by bored keyboard warriors, who look for something more intriguing than the usual “longest dick” challenge.
In our fictional and clearly satirical stories, on the other hand, the role of GIFTER is highly desired, but only a few are entitled to it because it requires great responsibilities, both toward humans and viruses.
Alex, one of this site’s authors, uses “Gifter” as nickname and it’s pure sarcasm: he lives with HIV, but strictly follows treatment and his viral load has been undetectable for years so he can’t spread the virus to his husband or anyone else. Entertainment and stories are the only gifts he’s keeping on giving.
Letter P
Post-exposure prophylaxis – PeP
Post-exposure prophylaxis is a drug therapy used when there is an emergency involving high risk of contracting HIV: sexual assault, accident, or consensual encounter with a person who later reveals to live with HIV and not following any anti-viral treatment.
Not intended for frequent use, and if the partner is HIV positive but on treatment, doctors tend not to give PeP as antivirals reduce the risk of transmissions to zero.
In case of exposure, for PeP to be effective, the person must go to the emergency room or infectious department within 48 to 72 hours after the risk event; post-exposure prophylaxis must be taken for 30 days.
Poz
“Poz” is an informal word to define “people living with HIV”.
Abbreviation of “positive” it also becomes a verb: “To poz” (or “to poz up”) means “transmit HIV to someone”, and of course the passive version is “I have been pozzed (up)”, “someone gave me HIV”.
However, it’s not a political or medical expression to use, the correct form is “people living with HIV”.
The opposite is “neg”, negative of course.
PrEP – pre-exposure prophylaxis
Pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, is a treatment intended for HIV-negative people at high risk of contracting HIV due to frequent condomless sexual activities.
Two types of regimen are available:
- daily based: one pill each day.
- event-based: pills taken before and after the presumed risky event.
Italy mostly uses Truvada for the treatment and this reduces infection risk up to 99%; for men, or people assigned male at birth, even Descovy is an option.
In the USA and Europe, a long-acting injectable medicine has approved (Apretude) which would require an injection every two months instead of daily pill – not yet available in every country.
PrEP protocol includes regular check-ups for sexually transmitted infections in order to treat them in time, if they ever happen.
Letter S
Serodiscordant
A serodiscordant couple is when one of the partners is living with HIV, the other is not. Informally known as “magnetic couple.”
At the beginning of HIV epidemic treatments weren’t available and this kind of relationships has been very complicated, due to the high probability of both death and of infecting the HIV-negative person.
The idea of having kids in such couples was automatically ruled out because assisted procreation involving “sperm washing” for people living with HIV was discovered in 1996 and antivirals came out right after.
But only with the “undetectable untransmittable U=U” statement, safe parenthood with HIV has become a scientific assumption.
Not to mention that rarely people were willing to accept the use of condoms for long time in a couple’s daily life.
In our days, on the other hand, a serodiscordant couple no longer experiences any medical obstacles thanks to antiviral therapies that nullify all risks. The biggest problem is, again and again, social stigma and ignorance.
Seroinvolved / seroinvolvement
HIV has become part of everyone’s life, even if only in the form of prejudices and fears.
Dividing the world into “positive” or “negative” people, or “high risk categories”, has never made sense; we are rather all seroinvolved.
This implies being conscious that the infection doesn’t care about how we physically look, and each individual should do their best to help stopping the epidemic, by informing themselves and especially by countering the social stigma toward those who live with the virus, because discrimination often kills more than the infection itself. Everyone of us is seroinvolved!
Source: Seroinvolved
Serophobia
Serophobia is the prejudice-based fear, discrimination and stigma against people living with HIV who often find themselves forced to keep their condition under wraps in order to avoid consequences at work, socially, emotionally and even in the health care setting.
Despite evident science advancements on treatment and prevention, it still happens that a doctor or dentist refuses to take care of a patient with HIV.
No matter if you should have studied science and work in health care, if you are strongly biased against underrepresented communities serophobia is just around the corner.
Status
Status, (HIV-status), is HIV’s presence/absence in a person’s blood: HIV positive or HIV negative status.
Stealthing
Stealthing is when someone takes the condom off during a sex intercorse, without the other partner’s consent. Or when the condom is sabotaged to make it break more easily.
This action is a violence as the stealther puts others at risk without making them aware about it.
Even HIV positive people who have condomless sex without being on meds, are called stealthers if they don’t warn an HIV negative partner about their real status. Not pest, not dirty, they are stealthers. Call things with their own names.
“Reverse stealthing” is also possible: most frequently it’s when a woman lies about her anti-conceptional treatments or uses man’s seed through any method to get pregnant without partner knowing.
Speaking about HIV, a reverse stealther can be someone who claims to be HIV positive to obtain condomless sex – rare cases, in bug chasing subculture.
Letter U
Underground
“Underground” is someone who, assuming they are not at risk, never use precautions in sex and don’t get tested for HIV either.
Unaware of their real condition they don’t follow any medical treatment to keep the infection under control, while maintaining high viral replication and continuing to spread it sexually, as well as risking to aggravate their own health, increasing chances of death.
In our fictional stories, “underground” is the worst insult you can address to someone. It could be equivalent to “coward”.
Undetectable
HIV undetectable viral load happens when tests find less than 50 copies of the virus per milliliter of plasma (liquid part of the blood), a result that can be achieved by regularly taking antiviral medication.
If the patient has been on treatment and with their viral load stably undetectable for at least six months, several scientific studies over time have shown that the likelihood of transmitting the virus to others sexually is reduced to zero: if it does not replicate inside blood, HIV is inactive in other bodily fluids either.
In Italy where we both live, this information hardly takes hold in mainstream media due to lack of sensitivity at the institutional level, but in English there have already been campaigns for years, conveying the acronym “U=U, “UEqualsU,” Undetectable = Untransmittable and by now it has become an almost assumed concept.
In our fictional stories, any HIV positive UNDETECTABLE is ostracized and bullied as if they are bragging about wearing a designer suit, when in fact they are sporting an evidently fake cheaply bought on the Internet.
Sources
Not being doctors, nurses or counselors we have no ability to provide social or medical education but we would like to share the sources where we get our information from:
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Who we are
We are Elena and Alessandro, known as Elettrona and Gifter. We met on line in 2019 and started a strong friendship. All about us