hello doctor Frascino i hope your days going well. here is my situation, im a straight guy with a girlfriend, were hiv negative, my best friend and roomate is gay and has a boyfriend, there hiv postive. he hasnt taken any meds because he wants to feel good for as long as he can, doesnt want any of the drugs. i love this guy weve been friends since we were little, never been concerened about hiv at all because theres no sex or anything were just bestfriends. well about 3 weeks ago he was making some food and cut his thumb with a knife, put a bandaid no big deal. prob like a day or two before that i also cut my thumb. so we were playing xbox later that night after he cut himself, using the same control and stuff when he realized his bandaid must have came off earlier. there was no blood or anything just cuts. ive never even thought about hiv because i only thought about it in terms of sex never blood. about a week and a half the lymph node on the right side of my adams apple became very swollen. i dont want to bring it up because im sure he has enough on his plate and i dont want to make it weird especially for something like this, we have never had a situation like this and i just want to inform myself and hopefully others because i see the way some of our former friends act. im just really not sure how it works with blood. is this something i should get a test over? and on the other side is this something that could make him sick or something because i try to be really careful like when i get sick or something i stay at my girlfriends i dont want to give him colds or something. ive just never thought about cuts and blood before and dont have any information on it. would appriciate your advice. id like to make a donation in his name if you can give me the address, thanks doctor for all the good work your doing!

Hi,

HIV can be transmitted by blood-to-blood contact. However, your two-day-old non-bleeding cut and your BFF's more recent cut (also not actively bleeding) would not be considered an HIV risk. HIV testing is not warranted. I would suggest you peruse the information in the archives of this forum. We have entire chapters devoted to HIV nonsexual transmission and HIV nonsexual prevention. Also, if your BFF doesn't know about this Web site, you might want to turn him on to it. It may help alleviate some of his fears surrounding HIV medications. Plus, it has as wealth of information on other topics he may well find helpful.

Donation information on making a gift to the Robert James Frascino AIDS Foundation in honor of your BFF can be found on the foundation's Web site at www.concertedeffort.org. The foundation's address is:

The Robert James Frascino AIDS Foundation 1000 Fremont Ave., Suite 145 Los Altos, CA 94024

Be well. Good luck and good health to both you and your BFF!

Dr. Bob