is it true..?

[imworried5454]

that if you have PEP tratment for a month, it kills off HIV at 80%+ success rate? What if you start atriretroviral treatment at 2 months, can it still kill of HIV? Who knows?

[Teak]

PEP must be started no later than 72 hours. The earlier the better and it's taken for 28 days. Most won't complete the PEP because of side effects. You will never be given PEP at 2 months.  

[imworried5454]

i mean, can't it lower viral load to 0 = negtive? at 2 months?

[imworried5454]

teak I know sideffects i took one pill, its unbearable.

[regularjoey]

If you take PEP at 2 months, then it won't be called PEP anymore, by definition.
Then it will be called ART.
And yes it can lower viral load to zero.
But you'd still have HIV!

[imworried5454]

no way? how can that be if viral load is 0 but one has HIV?

[regularjoey]

Viral load test measures the amount of the virus in the peripheral blood.
But HIV persists in other tissues.
That's why when people reach undetectable on meds and then stop taking meds, viral load comes right back to where it was.

[OrionQuest]

Also the key word is "undetectable".  It means there could be virus floating around but there's so few that the test can't pick it up.