I was diagnosed with HSV 2 byIgG antibody test several months ago.

I had a recent confirmatory IgG test.

I’ve never had an obvious outbreak.

I am a healthy man.

I started on acyclovir  400 mg twice a day at that time.

I have read that Dr. Hansfield feels like, in general, oral sex is safe sex.

If my partner gives me oral sex, with me being on acyclovir 400 mg twice a day, there is a minimal risk that they will acquire oral HSV-2.

Is that correct?

If we have intercourse with a condom, I have read that the risk of her contracting genital HSV-2 from me is quite low… Like three or four out of 10,000 per act.

Would you agree with that?

What are your thoughts on these issues.

Thank you!

What was the index value of your HSV 2 antibody test and were both tests by IgG? 

If the IgG test is correct, and some are not (and doing another one of the same type is not really confirmation unless both are quite high values), the risk of someone giving you oral sex on suppression is a low-risk event. 

Condoms reduce transmission by 96% so I guess you can do the math.  If you add suppression to that mix, you reduce transmission by another 48%.  These numbers become very low indeed.  I'm not clear they are as low as your quote.  It also depends upon where you are in a relationship.  Most transmission happens early on in relationships so being very consistent with condom use is very important as is taking your acyclovir at about the same time each day, about 12 hours apart. 

HSV 2 doesn't like the oral area very well, having what we call a strong site preference for the genital area.  So that also reduces the risk of someone giving you oral sex contracting HSV on their mouth.  If it did happen, it would look just like a cold sore and the only way to know if it was HSV 2 would be to swab test it for typing. 

Of course, if you used a condom for receiving oral sex, that would be almost a no-risk situation but some might find that undesirable.

Terri

Thank you very much for your useful information!

My test results were…

“HSV-2 IgG type specific antibody with reflex”

My first result was 16.60… Two months later, my result was 14.70.

I had  been on acyclovir 400 mg twice a day for two months.

The lab was LabCorp.

If you were me, would you pursue more testing?

What type?

From whom ?

One final question…

You’re probably familiar with this  study.

The study looked at over 1400 monogamous  discordant couples.

As far as I can tell, they used viral suppression, but no other kind of protection.

After eight months, 2% of the uninfected partners had become infected.

So even without condoms, on viral suppression, the infection rate is pretty low.

Did I interpret that study correctly?

Your test looks like quite a sound positive, yes.  I assume you have had symptoms?

I think I am an author on the study you quote, yes?  Corey, et al, 2004?

In that study, many people also used condoms though not all and not all the time,

And remember that these couples are what we can survivors - they've been together for a while before doing the study and many had been together for a long time, which in itself, results in a lower infection rate.  So we do have data but there are some "buts" in there.

Terri