In the 1980s and early 1990s, receiving news that one was infected with HIV was a literal death sentence. No vaccine or cure for AIDS exists. Back then, people with HIV could expect to become ill with AIDS within about ten years after becoming infected, and then live only one to two years on average after that. The virus destroys immune cells, leaving those infected vulnerable to a whole host of opportunistic infections. Eventually, one of them causes death. Thanks largely to the discovery of a “three-drug cocktail,” which became available in 1996, people infected with HIV now live longer and healthier lives
