Myth 2: Straight Men Don’t Have HIV
So here’s the deal: If 87 percent of Black women contract HIV through heterosexual sex and it’s not the Down-Low fueling HIV, this must mean that straight dudes have HIV too. And the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirms this: They estimated that in 2014, more than 2,108 Black heterosexual men received HIV diagnoses (compared with 4,654 black women).
And while it’s biologically easier for a woman to contract HIV from a man, that doesn’t mean that men can’t contract it from women. It happens way more often than you think. During unprotected sex, the virus can enter through the tip of the penis of through a cut or abrasion. This risk becomes even more heightened, if that man has an untreated STD.
Myth 3: I Can Tell If Someone Has HIV By Looking At Them
Can you tell if someone has other chronic diseases such as diabetes or heart disease? So why would HIV be any different? You can look “healthy,” pretty, fit and built and still be HIV-positive. So if you’re serious about protecting yourself, stop using your eyesight as a prevention tool and start using condoms and getting tested every year.