hiv and your pet

[jenn69]

my dog bit someone about 2 months ago ,she was protecting my girlfriend from her boyfriend ''at the time '' my dog has been latargic losing weight and now she is gettin sors on her chin i took her in and they cant figure out what the problem is now just this evening my girlfriend felt bad and told me that ''mike'' the person she bit has hiv and has had it for the past 10 months what r the chances of my dog getting it and what kinda of test should i ask for

[Jaybay]

http://www.vetinfo4dogs.com/dinfdis.html#HIV%20AIDS%20%20-can%20dogs%20and%20cats%20get%20infected?

Here is an answer to your question that I found on another vet board.  Looks like your dog should be OK as far as HIV is concerned, but you still need to get her to a vet to get to the bottom of the lethargy and weight loss.  Same thing happened with my dog and it turned out to be kidney failure.
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It is always hard to be absolutely certain that there is no truth at all
behind a rumor like this. However, there are no reports that I am aware of
in the veterinary or the human literature suggesting that either dogs or
cats can be infected by the human immunodeficiency virus. Therefore, it
seems to be almost impossible that this could be happening.

There is some confusion regarding the difference between human
immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV). These
are entirely different viruses and there has been no indication in the
literature that these strains of virus can cross react. The FIV virus has
been used as a model for studying the human infection and this research has
been published. One example was the recent "Lessons from the cat: feline
immunodeficiency virus as a tool to develop intervention strategies against
human immunodeficiency virus type 1",  by Elder et. al, AIDS Res Hum
Retroviruses, June 1998. It can be hard for people to accept that such
closely related viruses do not cross species lines but that appears to be
the case based on studies to date.

If dogs have a retroviral infection similar to HIV it has not been
identified. There is some suspicion that they do and a recent paper
"Possible relationships between canine hematopoietic neoplasia, other
malignancies and immune mediated diseases" by G. Theilen, in Leukemia April
1997 suggested that there may be an unidentified retrovirus infecting some
dogs. However, it has not been suggested that this is human
immunodeficiency virus.

Dogs and cats are both being used in studies relating to the control or
cure of HIV but these studies do not involve infection of dogs or cats with
the HIV virus. They relate to things like immunosuppression of T cells with
cyclosporin or similar treatments that are studied in dogs or cats in the
hope that the information will apply to human patients who actually are
infected with HIV.

You can search for information on HIV at the PubMed site:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.gov

I hope this helps to set your mind at ease.

Mike Richards, DVM

[Fourpaws]

Did you ask this question on the Ask A Vet forum?? The vet should have some good info for you. I hope it works out for you, I am sorry I don't have an answer for you.