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Summary

  • Sexual health is about more than freedom from sexually transmitted infections. Good sexual health also involves being happy about your sexuality, your choices and opportunities, and the sex you have.
  • Continuing to enjoy sex and relationships after an HIV diagnosis is good for your mental and physical health.
  • Having HIV is likely at some time to affect the way you feel about sex. You might like to seek support from partners, friends, or professionals to deal with concerns and problems.
  • Sexual problems can have both psychological and physical causes. There is help and support available for both.
  • Knowingly passing on HIV to a sexual partner without disclosing your status first is a criminal offence. Advice and support are available to help you with disclosure. It’s important to get expert advice immediately if you have a complaint made against you.
  • HIV-positive people can pass on HIV during anal or vaginal sex, but properly used condoms can prevent HIV – and other sexually transmitted infections – being passed on.
  • There is a risk that HIV can be transmitted by oral sex, but the risk is low.
  • Taking HIV treatment lowers viral load and there is a lot of debate about how infectious people taking HIV treatment correctly are.
  • There have been rare cases of people with HIV being reinfected with other strains of HIV.
  • It is useful to take advantage of free and confidential services such as regular sexual health check-ups, treatments and vaccinations in order to stay healthy, and to reduce the effects of HIV and the likelihood you might pass it on. 
  • There are many sexually transmitted infections and most can increase your chances of passing on HIV during sex, as well as potentially causing health problems.
This content was checked for accuracy at the time it was written. It may have been superseded by more recent developments. NAM recommends checking whether this is the most current information when making decisions that may affect your health.