4. Skin rash
Skin rashes can occur early or late in the course of HIV/AIDS. This could be another sign that you might not have run-of-the-mill allergies or a cold. Rashes can sometimes be like boils, with some itchy pink areas on the arms. The rashes can also appear on the trunk of the body. If [the rashes] aren’t easily explained or easily treated, you should think about having an HIV test.
READ: Q&A: What Are Remedies For HIV Skin Discoloration?
5. Nausea, vomiting, diarrhea
Anywhere from 30% to 60% of people have short-term nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea in the early stages of HIV. These symptoms can also appear as a result of antiretroviral therapy and later in the infection, usually as the result of an opportunistic infection. Diarrhea that is unremitting and not responding at all to usual therapy might be an indication. Or symptoms may be caused by an organism not usually seen in people with healthy immune systems.
READ: HIV/AIDS & Flu: What You Need To Know
6. Weight loss
Once called “AIDS wasting,” weight loss is a sign of more advanced illness and could be due in part to severe diarrhea. If you’re already losing weight, that means the immune system is usually fairly depleted. A person is considered to have wasting syndrome if they lose 10% or more of their body weight and have had diarrhea or weakness and fever for more than 30 days, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
READ: 9 HIV Myths That Need To Be Stopped
7. Dry cough
A dry cough can be an early first sign that something is wrong. And at first it can be dismissed as bad allergies. But if it goes on for a year and a half—and keeps getting worse—something’s wrong. Benadryl, antibiotics, and inhalers didn’t fix the problem. Neither do allergists. This symptom—an “insidious cough that could be going on for weeks that doesn’t seem to resolve,” —is typical in very ill HIV patients.
READ: HIV & Planning A Healthy Pregnancy
8. Pneumonia
The cough and the weight loss may also presage a serious infection caused by a germ that wouldn’t bother you if your immune system was working properly. There are many different opportunistic infections and each one can present differently. Other opportunistic infections include toxoplasmosis, a parasitic infection that affects the brain; a type of herpes virus called cytomegalovirus; and yeast infections such as thrush.