HIV Resources

Are you living with HIV and need help with services like medical care, medication, support programs or housing? Check out Illinois HIV Care Connect or call 311 to find out how to sign up for assistance.

If you’re HIV positive and pregnant, you can get specialized information and linkage to services by calling the 24/7 Illinois Perinatal HIV Hotline at 1-800-439-4079. This hotline is also for use by clinicians treating pregnant patients with HIV.

The City of Evanston Health and Human Services Department is offering free safer sex supplies sent through the mail to households within the City of Evanston.  To receive your supplies please fill out this form. The information submitted through this form will be used only to coordinate the delivery of your supplies. Your information will not be shared.

El departamento de salud de la ciudad de Evanston ofrece provisiones para el sexo mas seguro gratuitos enviados por correo a hogares con dirección postal en la ciudad de Evanston. Para recibir sus suministros por favor complete este formulario.   La información transmitida a través de este formulario sólo se utilizará para coordinar la entrega de sus provisiones. Sus datos no serán compartidos.

HIV, or human immunodeficiency virus, is a virus that attacks the body’s immune system. Without treatment, HIV infection can lead to AIDS, or acquired immunodeficiency syndrome. 

Currently, there is no cure for HIV. When someone gets HIV, they will have it for life. HIV treatments can control the virus. When people living with HIV start and stay on effective HIV treatment, they can live long, healthy lives and protect their partners. 

How HIV spreads

Most people who get HIV get it through anal or vaginal sex or through sharing drug injection equipment like needles or syringes. 

HIV can only be passed through some body fluids including blood, semen (cum), pre-seminal fluid (pre-cum), rectal fluids, and vaginal fluids. These body fluids must come into contact with someone else’s mucous membrane, damaged tissue, or enter into the bloodstream (from a needle or syringe) for HIV to spread.  

HIV is not spread by day-to-day contact like shaking hands, kissing, hugging, or sharing objects, food, or drinks.

Some things like a higher viral load, other sexually transmitted infections, and alcohol or drug use can increase the chances that HIV is spread. There are many things that can help prevent HIV.

HIV Prevention

There are many tools that can prevent HIV. Some things that decrease the chance of getting or transmitting HIV include using condoms the right way every time you have sex, getting tested and treated for STIs, limiting your number of sexual partners, and never sharing needles, syringes, or other drug injection equipment. 

People who are not living with HIV can use PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis) and PEP (post-exposure prophylaxis) to prevent HIV. When someone is exposed to HIV through sex or injection drug use, these medicines can work to keep the virus from establishing a permanent infection. For more information about PrEP for HIV prevention, visit this site or call 311.

People living with HIV can prevent transmitting HIV to others by taking HIV treatments to get to and keep an undetectable viral load. 

HIV Testing

Some people may have flu-like symptoms like fever, sore throat, chills, night sweats, swollen lymph nodes, mouth ulcers, rash, muscle, aches, or fatigue 2 to 4 weeks after a new HIV infection. Others may have no symptoms at all. 

The only way to know if you have HIV is to get tested. Knowing your HIV status is important to keep you and your partners healthy. 

There are many options for HIV testing that are quick, painless, and free. To find a HIV testing provider near you, visit this site or call 311.

If your test result is positive, you can find a doctor and take HIV treatment to help you to live a long, healthy life and protect others. If your test result is negative, you can take steps to prevent HIV. 

HIV Treatment

Treatment for HIV includes meeting with a health care provider and taking medicine. As soon as someone is diagnosed with HIV, they should start HIV treatment even if they have no symptoms. 

HIV medicine called antiretroviral therapy or ART, stops the virus from replicating and lowers the amount of HIV in the blood, often called the viral load. When someone takes HIV treatments as prescribed by a health care provider, their immune system gets stronger and their viral load can be so low that a test cannot find (or detect) HIV virus. This is called an undetectable viral load. Someone with an undetectable viral load will not spread HIV to others through sex. Having an undetectable viral load also lowers the chance that someone passes HIV through sharing injection equipment and during pregnancy, labor, and delivery. 

Getting and keeping an undetectable viral load is the best thing you can do to stay healthy. Keeping an undetectable viral load keeps your partners healthy too. To find HIV treatment and care services near you, visit this site or call 311.

HIV Disease

People living with HIV who take HIV treatment can live long and healthy lives. Without HIV treatment, people living with HIV typically progress through three stages of illness. Because HIV treatments are so effective at slowing or preventing progression of HIV disease, stage 3 or AIDS is less common today. 

Stage 1: Acute HIV Infection

Acute HIV infection is the stage after someone is first infected with HIV.

After someone gets HIV, the amount of HIV virus in the blood goes up. During acute HIV infection, the amount of HIV virus in the blood is very high and the chance of passing HIV to others is very high. 

Many people with acute HIV infection have flu-like symptoms. If you think you may have been exposed to HIV and have flu-like symptoms, get tested for HIV. 

Stage 2: Chronic HIV Infection

After acute HIV infection, without treatment, people may not have any symptoms or get sick but HIV stays active and continues to replicate in the body. 

For people who take HIV medicine as prescribed, HIV can be controlled and may never move into Stage 3 (AIDS).

Without HIV treatment, stage 2 may last years or may progress faster. At the end of Stage 2, the amount of HIV in the blood goes up. 

Stage 3: Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS)

Stage 3 or AIDS is the most severe stage of HIV infection. 

HIV attacks cells that fight infections, wearing down the body’s immune system. A person is diagnosed with Stage 3 or AIDS when immune cells called CD4 cells fall below 200 cells per milliliter of blood or when they develop certain illnesses. 

People with AIDS can have a high viral load and pass HIV to others easily. People with AIDS have damaged immune systems and can get other serious illnesses. 

Without HIV treatment, people with AIDS typically live about three years. 

Source: National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and Tuberculosis Prevention; Division of HIV Prevention

For more information, please see: https://www.hiv.gov/hiv-basics.