Why HIV increases your risk for cancer

HIV and cancer have always commanded an inordinate amount of trepidation from humans, and, it seems, the two were always birds of a feather. In fact, cancer was a major reason HIV was discovered. In 1981, a number of gay men presented with a rare lung infection and an aggressive form of soft-tissue cancer; the Kaposi Sarcoma. In the course of investigating what was causing the cancer, HIV was discovered.

Today, Kaposi Sarcoma is one of the most common cancers in HIV positive patients, yet is generally a rare cancer in people without HIV. It is one of the three cancers referred to as “Aids-defining” cancers, which means that having HIV together with any one of these cancers may mean that Aids has developed.