AIDS phobia

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Classification according to ICD-10
F45.2 Hypochondriac disorder
ICD-10 online (WHO version 2019)

The AIDS-phobia is a specific anxiety disorder , in which sufferers - have excessively strong fear with - even after repeated negative test results HIV infected or AIDS to be -krank. This includes fears of people who have or could have this disease. These include, for example, risk groups such as homosexuals, prostitutes, drug addicts or simply anyone who, from the perspective of the sick person, could be sick with HIV or AIDS, for whatever reason.

The phenomenon of the AIDS phobia appeared on a larger scale in Central Europe in the 1980s, after HIV became known to a wider public. The internist Hans Jäger from Munich was one of the first to examine the phobia on a larger scale in a study by the Munich-Schwabing Municipal Hospital . In doing so, he classified that the patients seeking advice were usually completely unjustifiably worried because they did not belong to any risk group and had already carried out one or more negative HIV tests. However, this would only have increased their fear. According to Jäger, the great fear of low risk is the "hallmark of the AIDS phobia". According to Jäger, the patients showed the usual but unspecific " symptoms " of AIDS in the early stages, such as night sweats, diarrhea, loss of appetite, and in some cases weight loss, but above all fatigue and tiredness.

According to psychologists Berhadette Collet and Cindy Bönhardt, the causes of the phobia often originate from sexual contact with risk groups such as prostitutes or homosexuals. According to Willi Butollo , the patients were often confronted with special anxiety disorders and hypochondria earlier . The disease can be treated well through psychotherapy , says Bönhardt.

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