How to Determine if Your Partner Is at Risk for HIV or AIDS

You can never be 100% sure that your partner does not have HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, or that he is not at risk for the disease. You can, however, look for signs that indicate he has a higher risk than normal of having HIV.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

1. Get to know your partner. Spend hours, days, weeks, months or even years talking with him and meeting his friends and family.
2. Look at his use of alcohol and drugs. Has he ever gotten drunk or high and then had sex with someone? Used an intravenous needle that someone else used? Such acts put your partner at a higher risk of infection.
3. Look for signs of bad judgment or promiscuity in his sexual history.
4. Ask him to make a commitment not to have sex with anyone else. If he declines, you are at a higher risk to come in contact with the AIDS virus.
5. Ask him to make a commitment not to share intravenous needles with anyone else. This may mean entering drug treatment, learning to properly clean needles before using them and/or using only new needles. (MIMI -- DO WE REALLY WANT TO ENCOURAGE THIS? IF SOMEONE IS USING IV DRUG PERIOD THEY ARE A BAD PARTNER..)
6. WHAT ABOUT OTHER RISKS - BLOOD TRANSFUSIONS.

Tips & Warnings

• Have your partner take an HIV antibody test (and AIDS blood test) and show you proof that he is not infected.
• To increase the certainty that the results of an AIDS blood test are correct, persons who take the test are advised to not have any risk (unprotected sex or sharing intravenous needles) for 3 months before they take the test.
• Use a condom everytime you have sexual intercourse if you have any doubt about your partner's past.