hippyherpy

This article says that the 1/5 stat is only accounting for people that are aware the have herpes. It says that the 90% of people who don't know are in addition to that. http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/colette-kenney/dating-with-herpes_b_1609226.html According to DatingWithHerpes.org (DWH.org) about 45-60 million Americans have genital herpes. That's roughly 14-20 per cent of the U.S. population. And this statistic only includes the people who are aware that they have the virus. According to DWH.org "Most people with genital herpes have infrequent, mild, or no noticeable symptoms, and 90 per cent of them are totally unaware that they even have it." And that, according to DWH.org is because "surprisingly, most doctors do NOT include a blood test for herpes even when they are testing their patients for other common STDs." Can someone clarify this? Does it mean that if 1/5 people in America have it and know, and that's only 1/10 of the projected number, then .. wait that doesn't make sense.. ?? Help please. I thought it was 90% of the 1/5 aren't aware they have it.

Also, if I'm taking Valtrex, that stuff doesn't really matter so much, right? Supposedly arginine "feeds" the virus.

You look sexy to me ;) Even if I didn't have herpes and you did, I'd probably still hook-up with you.

Understand that rejection will happen. Often. That's the deal with this thing from what I've experienced. That said, life is full of rejections. There's a tendency in our culture for people to want everything to be perfect. Reality is fraught with more complications. I've had some sucky rejections. To the point where sex was guaranteed and then disclosure and then red light. I've also had successes. For me, herpes is just another punch in the face from life. But it's not a knockout and I keep going and say fuck that. I do disclose, but there's really no reason why someone who is willing to have casual sex with a stranger should reject me, logically speaking. I'm on Valtrex and use condoms, so there's less a chance of some girl getting it from me than some random guy who has it but doesn't know (or some dude with oral herp who goes down on her). The logic is there, but people often make decisions based on emotion. Anyway, you have to keep going and not let any one particular rejection get you down. There are more level headed people out there who don't think herpes is a big deal and can understand when you explain to them that you are doing what you can to be as safe as possible. For the rejectors, you got to just got the next button and drop them from your mind.

Good thread title, too. This forum needs to have an autocorrect funnel that doesn't make "herpes" into "heroes" it happens a lot.

Read it it says 1 and 2 together .

They did- that's what's in that link. it's a littl over half a billion people. 1/14 of the worlds population.

Happy New Year!!!

Wait it's actually half billion- n January, WHO estimated that 417 million people aged 15-49 years have HSV-2 infection, which causes genital herpes. Taken together, the estimates reveal that over half a billion people between the ages of 15-49 years have genital infection caused by either HSV-1 or HSV-2.

Over 3.7 billion people have genital herpes.. http://www.news-medical.net/news/20151029/Over-37-billion-people-under-50-have-genital-HSV-1-infection-shows-WHO-report.aspx 3.7 BILLION!!!!!!! again 3 . 7 B I L L I O N

Oral sex and kissing link hsv1 and hsv2 together in my opinion. Yet nobody is obligated to disclose that they have hsv1 orally. Think about that- 9/10 people have it in their mouths and pretty much everyone has oral sex. It's the biggest steaming load of horse shit of herpes confusion. Who doesn't give head? There's something that doesn't make sense about the numbers. If 9/10 people have herpes in their mouths and almost everyone gives oral sex, and nobody discloses oral herpes, why doesn't almost everyone have genital hsv1? They need to pass a law that either says that everyone who has HSV1 or 2, genital or oral, must disclose, or have get rid of mandated disclosure all together.

Supposedly we are supposed to avoid higher arginine to lysine ratios in foods. I've been reading that people with herpes should, in general, avoid protein powders. Protein powders do tend to have a lot of arginine, but they also have a lot of lysine. For example, Optimum Whey Gold looks like it has a lot more lysine than arginine. http://www.walgreens.com/store/c/optimum-nutrition-100-whey-gold-standard-protein-dietary-supplement-powder-vanilla-ice-cream/ID=prod6051343-product "Typical amino acid profile (milligrams per serving): Essential amino acids; tryptophan 405, valine 1422, threonine 1654, isoleucine 1573, leucine 2531, lysine 2233, phenylalanine 748, methionine 492. Conditionally essential amino acids: Arginine 505, cystine 494, tyrosine 703, histidine 423, proline 1509, glutamine and precursors 4082. Nonessential amino acids: Aspartic acid 2508, serine 1126, glycine 412, alanine 1180." Anyone here who lifts weights and has looked into this? Or, anyone who can chime in on this? The lysine / arginine thing? Does it matter if you are taking daily valtrex?

I recently posted in my other thread on herpes and vaccine, and it didn't seem to bump. Anyone know what's up with that?

Also found this article about HSV and how it relates to HIV http://motherboard.vice.com/read/hivs-biggest-moves-are-hetero-and-needle-free Straight, Needle-Free Populations Are Becoming HIV's Biggest Movers Written by MICHAEL BYRNE June 28, 2014 // 04:10 PM EST Among diseases, HIV has a unique relationship with its risk factors. While pretty much any illness has a set of circumstances that make it more likely for a given individual to contract it—some diseases and individuals much more than others—HIV spent much of its named existence as something "of" certain populations. Inevitably then, risk factors comingled with identity, and stigma bloomed. No doubt there are those remaining, even in 2014, whose whole fucked-up worldview gets a boost from HIV remaining the scourge of gay African-American men and intravenous drug users; for typical far-right narratives, those are two highly-encodable demographics. HIV's relationship to the world is changing, however, and quickly. Years of intensive outreach within high-risk populations is paying off, and the relative silence about HIV outside of those groups is having quite the opposite effect, while, at the same time, HIV itself is finding hetero-transmission help from its pal herpes. In a study released on Friday, researchers at New York University's Center for Drug Use and HIV Research describe HIV infection rates among IV drug users in New York City falling to an epidemic-low of 10 percent, down from '90s highs approaching 50 percent. In the same time period, HIV rates among heterosexual, non-IV drug users, historically considered to be one of lowest risk pools (but still above not-at-all drug users, for a number of reasons), doubled, from 7 to 14 percent. According to researchers, what's behind the increase, in part, is the spread of HIV's viral ally, human herpesvirus 2 (genital herpes, HSV-2). HIV transmission from heterosexual (vaginal) sex is, generally, less likely than other, more-discussed vectors. In fact, the likelihood of transmission from a positive male to a negative female partner is just eight in 10,000, while female to male transmission should occur in four out of 10,000 risk events. For receptive anal intercourse, that jumps to 138 transmissions out of 10,000, and needle sharing should yield 63 infections per 10,000 positive-to-negative shares. The thing about herpes, however, is that it makes transmission much, much more likely, and infection rates for HSV-2 in the United States sit at around one fifth of all adults, with the hardest-hit demographic being African-American women, with a near 50 percent infection rate. "Heterosexual intercourse is usually not very efficient for transmitting HIV, but the efficiency of heterosexual transmission nearly triples in the presence of herpes simplex virus type 2," said Don Des Jarlais, the study's lead author, in a statement from NYU. There are a couple of reasons for the boost, according to the NIH. For one, genital herpes in outbreak mode causes lesions, open sores through which an HIV virus might find easy passge into a new recruit. Second, even if those lesions are healed and the herpes infection is considered latent, the CD4+ T cells that HIV needs to bind with and infect are known to hang around the sites of healed lesions, offering an alternative passage into the host. Part of the answer, according to Jarlais and a growing chorus of public health experts, is what's known as "treatment as prevention." That is, we know well enough that antiretroviral therapy and the corresponding drop in viral load can torpedo the likelihood of HIV transmission. So if more HIV patients are getting proper treatment, then they're far less likely to spread the disease. What's more, administering antiretroviral therapy to uninfected individuals boosts those individuals' resistance to infection as well. Obviously that's not the most general solution, but it makes sense in known high-risk populations. Jarlais concludes optimistically: "If we can implement these programs on a large scale, we should be able to control sexual transmission of HIV in the city, and achieve the goal of an "End to the AIDS Epidemic."

I've got a little dilemma. There are two girls I've been talking to online who swear they are clean. I've disclosed that I have herpes and they both still say they want to have unprotected sex with me. I'm a little scarred of getting HIV now that I have herpes. My odds of getting it through vaginal sex if HIV is present in my partner is 1/1000. That's extremely low. Couple that with the fact that heterosexual women in USA have extremely low rates of HIV, and I'm thinking it is a super low possibility that I'd get it. That said, if a girl is agreeing to have sex with a guy raw who has explained that he has herpes and also told her that he's using pills, what does that say about her?

Merry xmas So, I can have blow jobs?

Adrial has a page where he describes how it is almost impossible to give your partner hsv2 in their mouth if they go down on you. This fact check page herpes says that it is and that people should use condoms during oral sex http://herpesresourcecenter.com/herpes-myths-vs-facts Is that page wrong, or...?

Once again I disclosed and had success. Beautiful Eastern European girl didn't seem to care as long as we used condoms.

I don't mind a little "cheesy" much needed levity brought to the discussion of herpes.

Came across this video explaining away some of the herpes stigma It's an interesting framing of a lot of what is said here.. - Herpes isn't really a big deal and people don't need to worry about it. - Most of the time it's not even noticeable. - Even if you don't have Herpes, we all have many types of little red bumps on our body like mosquito bites and acne. - Herpes is essentially a non-issue unless you are immune compromised or are in late term pregnancy. - So many people have herpes that if you don't have it you are the weird one. - Any adult who is sexually active has come in contact with herpes (anyone who is kissing people has most likely kissed a herpes mouth).

It's definitely possible to have casual sex with herpes. One way to do it is to make sure your partner knows that the risk of them catching anything from you is super low. Use meds and condoms. Or not. Before I got herpes, I had casual sex with two women who disclosed to me they had it. I used a condom and don't think j got my herpes from them because my blood test showed that I had herpes before the second one and didn't gab it after the first. Also what can help is if you convey that you've had a lot of experience having sex with herpes and not be freaked out about you guys having sex. The last girl who got me to consent told me she'd had boyfriends who didn't get it from her and even ate her out (that's a tricky one because I didn't know much about it back then). Let them know that you are on top of your stuff. The one thing I've been grappling with in disclosure is that I sometimes think you don't have to make a huge deal out of it. Did you tell someone and they are cool with it, then leave it at that. Don't keep talking about it if you don't need to because then you might needlessly freak them out. You can give the facts, very simple and straight up, but you don't need to get into a big thing if they are ok with it after you disclose and tell them that the risk is very low if use condums and are taking a pill etc.

Well they did use it for me.. if it says index table does that mean very low likely hood of transmission as well?

I asked for it because I've read a lot of stories of false positives etc. Wanted to get a retest after a few months from my initial out break.

Europeans don't seem to care about it as much. Also I think that there is something to be said for the heat of the moment disclosure. That's worked for me. I just told a girl who i hung out with last night. We haven't had sex yet but I disclosed and she seemed fine with it.

^Ive never had the PCR- My new doctor gave me that when I asked for a herpes test. Double checking.