I don't know the correct term, I do know that to conduct research on HIV, you have to have approval from the "National Institutes of Health", which is part of the Department of Health and Human Services.

I'm going to assume you are asking me.

HIV is a retro virus. It doesn't kill people, but it's still real.

So does Magic Johnson have Aids or HIV? I don't think you can live for over 20 years with AIDS and be as healthy as him.

HIV.

Retroviruses only reproduce with any great success from mother to child. HIV is notoriously hard to isolate even in blood, little less semen or saliva. HIV being a retrovirus probably means that Magic Johnson got it from his mother, although there is a slight chance (estimated to be 1 in 500) that he caught it from a sex partner.

I think the estimate is probably high, since it's based on the assumption that HIV is a "new" virus and not just one of the hundreds of retroviruses that live harmlessly within human bodies.