since then i have had no visible warts or lesions and my wife has had all normal pap smears. we are currently 69 years old and monogamous since 1999. are we each considered to be free of active infection and/or immune to the presumed original strain(s) of hpv in the sense that we can have genital/semen contact in all parts of our bodies (oral, anal, etc.) without fear of developing hpv genitally or elsewhere on our bodies? our question pertains only to the any strain present prior to 1999.  i don't know exactly what reactivation means but i would like to apply the question to a possible (?) reactivation of the original strain as well. thank you.

My guess is your genital growths were not warts, but skin tags, which are just likely to recur after surgical removal as warts would be. The acetic acid (vinegar) evaluation is now known to be highly unreliable, so that 24 year distant evaluation can't be relied on. Even if they had been warts at the time, probably your wife's cervical dysplasia had nothing to do with them. For the most part, different HPV types cause warts and pre-cancerous cervical dysplasia.

Of course, 90% of all sexually active people have genital HPV at one time or another, and your wife obviously did when her pap smear was abnormal. But I see no reason to be concerned that either you or your wife still has a persisting HPV infection. While it is not possible to rule out future reactivation, the chance of it is very low. There is no cause for concern.

I hope this has been helpful. Let me know if anything isn't clear. Best wishes--

HHH, MD

As concerns anyone's current infection of HPV, is it transmissible via indirect contact such as (a) I touch urine of infected person on toilet then touch my genitals or (b) infected person touches genitals, shakes my hand and I touch my genitals?

Thank you.