[Question #2861] Last question about transmission from a father about a child

94 months ago

Dear experts, thank you for this site and for answering my previous question. I just wanted to make sure I understand and I can calm another parent I know who just like me told me he is worrying about his child constantly even before they grow up and we teach them about condoms etc. From what I have understood from you and the internet :

- virus is fragile, it does not survive on surfaces for very long

- it needs a host to attach to and would live only for a few minutes if it does not find a host - a human body (through needles, cuts, sex)

- it survives frozen in right PH, preservatives and without much air

So here is my second and last question (wont bother you, I promise, again. I do not want you to think that i do not value your time) when my child gets ice cream i can see sometimes some goo on the chocolate that should not be there. I start going into panic mode thinking what if it were someone's fluids that accidentally got on top of the ice cream's chocolate before it is sealed (don't know, a guy/girl who was standing at the conveyor belt sneezed and it got on ice cream, but his sneeze had some blood in it (like during nose bleeds). So the fluid is on the chocolate now and it gets packaged into the foil straight away and , of course, into the freezer. I realise this is incredibly (to say the least) far fetched, but this is the only type of scenarios that get me worried . If I buy that ice cream 3 months later for my child after a dentist's visit, do I need to panic that she may get infected? I do not want to deprive her of that joy but also panic if i see something on the ice cream after she opens the foil

Would the virus be dead because although temperatures are low ( - 20, freezing), and it is sealed in the foil, it does not have the right PH and host to survive?

Thank you

H. Hunter Handsfield, MD

94 months ago

Welcome back to the forum. You did not need to start a new thread: you could have posted these as follow-up questions in last week's thread with Dr. Hook, without the additonal fee. In any case, I am answering this time. I also reviewed your other thread and agree with the advice you received from Dr. Hook.

It is true that HIV is fragile and doesn't survive long outside the body; needs a host to attach to; and can survive when frozen. But these facts are not important, and you are asking the wrong questions. Whether HIV could contaminate your child's ice cream and survive there does not matter. Such transmission has never once happened and never will. The biological reasons don't matter. The busiest HIV/AIDS clinics never have patients who did not acquire the virus sexually or by known blood contact, like sharing needles for drug injection, or other standard risks. Nobody in the world is known to have caught HIV by swallowing contaminated food. Definitely do not deny your child the joy of ice cream for such a reason.

HHH, MD

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94 months ago

Thank you , Doctor! You are right, there was no known case like that, but i would, I think, still feel just a little bit better knowing there is no biological probability the virus would survive. Would you say biologically it is very, very , very unlikely for the virus to survive without preservatives and required PH in that type of scenario. I understand there are no studies for things like that. Just your educated opinion would be enough for me. Thank you)

H. Hunter Handsfield, MD

94 months ago

Because ice cream is frozen product, HIV that contaminated it probably would survive a long time. But the chance an infected fluid would come in contact with the ice cream during preparation or packaging is very remote. And anyway, swallowing HIV is low risk (which is one reason that oral sex is safe sex: it almost never transmits HIV). So even if somehow the ice cream were contaminated, there would be no risk to your child or anyone else.

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94 months ago

Thank you, doctor. Is it still low risk if I am on a high dose of anti-acids ( proton pump inhibitors) ?

H. Hunter Handsfield, MD

94 months ago

Yes. There are no medications that increase the risk of catching HIV, and certainly PPIs do not do so.

That completes the two follow-up comments and replies included with each question and so ends this thread. Please note the forum does not permit repeated questions on the same topic or exposure. This being your second, it will have to be your last; future new questions about on this topic and your fears about HIV or other STDs will be deleted without reply and without refund of the posting fee. This policy is based on compassion, not criticism, and is designed to reduce temptations to keep paying for questions with obvious answers. In addition, continued answers tend to prolong users' anxieties. Finally, such questions have little educational value for other users, one of the forum's main purposes. Thank you for your understanding.

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