If you have herpes, you should avoid having sex while you have lesions or other symptoms of the virus (though you can still spread the infection even if you’re asymptomatic). Using latex condoms correctly every time you have sex can reduce your risk of transmitting or becoming infected with genital herpes, but condoms do not offer 100 percent protection. Still, if you have herpes, whether you take medication or not, you should tell anyone you have sex with, so that they know the risk. But there are medicines that can prevent or shorten the outbreaks, as well as make it less likely that you will pass it on to intimate partners, notes the CDC. Once you have herpes, you’ll always have it. Also, having herpes raises the risk of getting HIV, the CDC notes. And herpes can be transmitted from one person to another even when there are no symptoms, per the CDC. On the minus side, it helps explain how and why the infection is so widespread: If you don’t know you have it, you are unlikely to take steps to avoid spreading it. On the plus side, this underscores how mild the symptoms of herpes can be. And since most of the time there are no symptoms, many people don’t know they have herpes. Sometimes people mistake herpes for a pimple, ingrown hair, or the flu, notes Planned Parenthood. They are also much less frequent with a genital HSV-1 infection than a genital HSV-2 infection. Recurrent outbreaks are usually shorter and less severe than the initial one, and they may decrease in frequency over time. Many people can sense a recurrent outbreak coming on hours to days before the lesions appear, with symptoms that may include genital pain, or tingling or shooting pains in the legs, hips, or buttocks. Recurrent outbreaks of genital herpes are common, notes the CDC. Other symptoms may include a fever, body aches, swollen lymph nodes, and/or a headache.Īccording to Planned Parenthood, additional symptoms of genital herpes may include difficulty urinating or burning when you urinate, as well as itching. The blisters break and leave painful ulcers or sores that may take two to four weeks to heal.ĭuring the first outbreak, herpes lesions often last longer and are more contagious. On average, the initial herpes outbreak will occur four days after exposure, with a range of 2 to 12 days. When herpes symptoms do occur, lesions usually appear as small, painful blisters on or around the genitals, rectum, or mouth, per the CDC. Most people who have herpes are asymptomatic, or they have symptoms that are so mild that they may not even notice them, according to the CDC. You can also get genital herpes by having vaginal or anal sex with someone who has the virus, per the CDC. That is partly because a person who has oral herpes caused by HSV-1 can spread it to their partner’s genitals during oral sex. However, an increasing number of genital herpes cases are being caused by HSV-1, not HSV-2. HSV-2 most often affects the genital area. Both viruses are transmitted by close contact with an infected person. HSV-1, or oral herpes, is usually associated with cold sores or fever blisters around the mouth, and it is often transmitted through nonsexual contact with infected saliva. There are two types of herpes viruses: herpes simplex 1 ( HSV-1) and herpes simplex 2 (HSV-2). Herpes is caused by the herpes simplex virus (HSV). More American women than men have herpes, possibly because the disease is somewhat easier to pass from men to women than from women to men, notes the CDC. It’s so prevalent in the United States that about 12 percent of people ages 14 to 49 have it, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Genital herpes is a common and incurable sexually transmitted disease (STD).
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