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I was just exposed to herpes


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I recently went on vacation and ended up having a one night stand with a girl who told me she had genital herpes. We were drunk and in the moment and still had unprotected sex and oral sex(both received). She told me she found out she had it 4 years ago and has never had a breakout. Is that a good sign?

I'm still waiting to hear if she knows if it's type 1 or 2 and if she is on meds for it.

Is there any other info I should try to get from her??

I would like to go have the test performed since all the stats says so many people have it without knowing it. I'm just really freaking out...

Any info is appreciated.

 

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To help you put this in perspective, you can assume about 80% of your partners have either HSV1, HSV2 or both. It's very common and, as you mentioned, most people who have it don't know it. So the likelihood is high that you have encountered this before, unless this was your first sexual experience. And unless you regularly get tested yourself, you may already have HSV. Many people acquire HSV1 during childhood, for instance.

 

Also, when you have sex with someone who has HSV, you may or may not be exposed to the virus. HSV sheds intermittently without associated symptoms and those who have it don't know when that's happening, but most of the time they are not shedding virus. For instance, if she has HSV2, and she is asymptomatic, she may be shedding virus 10-20% of the time and not shedding virus 80-90% of the time, so odds would be higher you had sex when she was not shedding/contagious. If she was shedding/contagious when you had sex, yes, there is a chance you could have been infected, but risk is relatively low in the absence of symptoms (an "outbreak").

 

Risk statistics are framed as annual risk. If you had unprotected sex with her regularly (let's say 2-3 times per week) for a year, and she is not taking antivirals, and this activity never coincided with a herpes outbreak, risk of contracting HSV2 would be 4% over the course of a year. That does not mean each time you have sex the risk is 4%. Many times the risk is 0% because she is not shedding all the time. 4% reflects a combined risk that factors in shedding and non-shedding time over the course of an entire year. If she takes antivirals, that risk is cut in half to 2% per year. If she has genital HSV1 rather than HSV2, the risk is likely 1/3 of the numbers I previously quoted because genital HSV1 tends to shed 3 times less often than genital HSV2 (studies are in progress to better assess this risk, but this is the assumption for now based on average shedding rates).

 

As for testing, if you get an IgG blood test done now, it will be too soon to reflect this recent encounter, but it may tell you if you are already infected and just didn't know it. Otherwise, it's best to wait at least 12 weeks from the encounter before testing. But I would think through your decision to test before doing so, knowing that roughly 80% of adults are infected with HSV. Set your expectations for your own results and think through how you would deal with a positive test result. There's no right and wrong when it comes to whether or not to test, it's a highly personal decision, but I think it's advisable to really think it through.

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Thanks for the information. I'm just freaking out about this. She just told me that she has type 2 and that she is on meds for it. I wonder if it helps to go ahead and get an antiviral prescription and start taking it just in case. I will def get tested at 12 weeks and think through testing earlier.

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I understand. No, taking antivirals will not help you, but they help reduce risk of transmission from her to you. Bearing in mind that perhaps 1/4 - 1/3 of young women you date will likely be infected with HSV2 (more like half if you date older women), and most of them will not know they are infected, your risk is comparatively average with someone like this woman who is taking precautions such as disclosing and taking antivirals, though you can lower risk further by using condoms. In other words, you will encounter others with HSV2 who are higher risk because they are not taking precautions and you will encounter some women who are not infected with HSV2 and pose no risk of HSV2 transmission at all. This woman falls in between in that she is aware of her HSV status and is taking precautions.

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