AIDS can be thought of as the most severe form of HIV disease. All but a handful of medical experts now believe that HIV is the primary agent that leads to the development of AIDS.
So What's the Connection Between HIV and AIDS?
When a person with an HIV-weakened immune system comes down with one or more of these rare opportunistic infections, or has a T cell count below 200 or 14%, that person may be diagnosed by a doctor as having AIDS. "AIDS" stands for "Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome." The "syndrome" part means that AIDS is not a single disease but a collection of diseases. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has put together a list of 26 "AIDS-defining illnesses" in adults. Diagnosis of AIDS in children involves a list of slightly different ailments.
