Hi there,

I have a question:

I had protected sex. After 65 days from that, I did an HIV EIA test. The result is negative.

My question is: does that mean I am 100% free from HIV? Is an EIA enough? Do I need retest again or am I fine?

Thank you so much

To Whom It May Concern,

The HIV EIA test is an extremely reliable test, given that you wait an appropriate amount of time after the possible exposure to get reliable results. EIA is short for ELISA which stands for enzyme-linked immuno-sorbent assay, meaning that it tests for your body’s immune response to the virus, in this case the HIV virus. This production of antibodies, in most people, takes up to 6 weeks. About 95%-97% of the population will have a detectable immune response after 41 days, just one day short of 6 weeks. For individuals with a healthy immune system, the results are considered conclusive, meaning that no further testing is necessary, after 3 months.

In your situation, you waited 65 days, or about 9 weeks. The fact that you did not get a positive HIV test results is more than promising, since by this time, most of the population would test positive. Nonetheless, the window period is 3 months, which means a follow-up HIV antibody test is a good idea.

There is one other aspect of your question that I have not yet addressed. The fact that you used protection is extremely important and means that you were most likely protected from getting most sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV.

If you simply did not want to wait the full 3 months to get conclusive results on the antibody test, you should consider the HIV DNA PCR test (human immunodeficiency virus, deoxyribonucleic acid, polymerase chain reaction test), which offers conclusive results after just 28 days, per manufacturer’s recommendation. Given what we know about the acute stage of the virus and the test itself, you are able to test even earlier than 28 days, and still get extremely reliable test results. Between 11 and 16 days after exposure, somebody with HIV will after a viral count of over one million copies of HIV virus per milliliter of blood. The DNA PCR test detects as little as 10 copies of HIV DNA per milliliter of blood. As you can see, the amount of virus present would greatly exceed the minimum limit of virus needed to show up on the test.