Contents
People at risk and risk factors for genital herpes
People at risk
- People with immune system deficiency caused by human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), serious illness, organ transplant, etc;
- The women. Men are more likely to pass genital herpes to a woman than the other way around;
- Homosexual men.
Risk factors
By transmission:
- Unprotected sex;
- A large number of sexual partners in a lifetime.
Precision. Having a large number of uninfected sexual partners does not increase the risk of infection. However, the greater the number of partners, the greater the risk of encountering one who is infected (often the person ignores the infection or has no symptoms);
- A recently infected partner. Silent reactivation occurs more frequently when the first outbreak is recent.
Factors triggering recurrences:
People at risk and risk factors for genital herpes: understanding everything in 2 min
- Anxiety, stress;
- Fever ;
- The period ;
- Irritation or vigorous friction of the skin or mucous membranes;
- Another disease;
- A sunburn ;
- Surgery;
- Certain drugs that suppress or reduce immune responses (especially chemotherapy and cortisone).
Mother-to-child transmission of the virus If the virus is active at the time of childbirth, it can be passed to the baby. What are the risks? A mother’s risk of transmitting genital herpes to her baby is very low if she has been infected before her pregnancy. Indeed, his antibodies are transmitted to his fetus, which protects him during childbirth. On the other hand, the risk of transmission is élevé if the mother contracted genital herpes during her pregnancy, especially during last month. On the one hand, she does not have time to transmit protective antibodies to her baby; on the other hand, the risk that the virus is active at the time of childbirth is high.
Preventative measures Infection of a newborn baby with theherpes can have serious consequences, because the baby does not yet have a highly developed immune system: he may suffer from brain damage or blindness; he may even die from it. This is why, if a pregnant woman has a first infection with genital herpes towards the end of her pregnancy or if she suffers from a recurrence around the time of childbirth, a cesarean section is strongly recommended. He is important than pregnant women who were infected before pregnancy by notify their doctor. For example, your doctor may prescribe an antiviral medicine towards the end of the pregnancy to reduce the risk of a recurrence during childbirth. If the partner of an uninfected pregnant woman is a carrier of the virus, it is very important that the couple follow the basic measures to prevent the transmission of HSV to the letter (see below). |