Symptoms Of Herpes

Once a person has been infected with herpes, it is impossible for modern medicine to remove the virus or to completely cure the disease; there is always a chance, however slim, of another outbreak.  

However, not all herpes viruses are created equal, and not every person develops symptoms.  Type 1, the mild form, mostly infects the mouth where it causes cold sores; it rarely spreads to the genitals.    All over the world, children younger than ten often get their first outbreak of cold sores after getting infected with Type I Herpes.  If they have healthy immune systems, their bodies will usually learn quickly how to fight back the infection.  The cold sores may never return, and if they do, they are rarely as painful as during the first outbreak.   On the other hand, a person with a damaged immune system can have recurring and extremely severe symptoms.   

Genital herpes, the disease caused by the Herpes Simplex Type 2 virus, spreads easily because the virus travels from one person to another during sexual contact, by hitching a ride on the mouth and the sexual organs.  For this reason, Type 2 tends to infect teenagers rather than young children, and it can be a more painful form of Herpes Simplex than Type 1, because it is far more likely to cause the symptoms most people associate with herpes:  outbreaks of blisters and open sores  -- also known as ulcers -- in the genital areas.  Type 1 does sometimes spread to the genitals, and Type 2 can infect the mouth, but these are not common occurrences.  

The only ways to prevent a genital herpes infection are either to remain abstinent, or to practice a form of safe sex that does not allow any exchange of bodily fluids.  Unprotected oral sex can transmit herpes just as easily as genital sex, but the virus can't move through a thick condom.     

Although the symptoms caused by the Type 2 virus are usually more unpleasant than the symptoms of Type 1, the Type 2 virus is not necessarily more dangerous to a person's long-term health.   As with Type 1, many people never find out they are carriers, because they don't have outbreaks.  Among the people who do break out with blisters and ulcers, most have immune systems resilient enough to get the body accustomed to the virus, and they will find either that they only have one outbreak, or that their symptoms lessen with each subsequent outbreak.  Generally, herpes patients have their most severe outbreak soon after they are first infected, and in the year following the infection, although they can have as many as four or five new outbreaks, each one is less painful and severe than the last.  Then there may not be another outbreak for years.  Scientists don't understand what circumstances provoke recurring outbreaks after the first year or so, but one of the most popular hypotheses is that they are caused by life stress.  

The most important factor in determining the seriousness of the disease is not the virus itself, but the strength of the patient's immune system -- the body's ability to protect itself by making antibodies that stop the virus from reproducing.   

Although herpes symptoms show up on the skin, the virus itself infects nerve cells.   Although any herpes simplex virus can potentially take up residence anywhere in the body where there are nerve cells, HSV-1 tends to settle in the facial ganglia, the networks of cells that transmit nerve impulses to the face, while HSV-2 usually migrates to nerve cells in the lower half of the spinal cord, near the pelvis.  The DNA from both HSV-1 and HSV-2 gloms onto the nerve endings under the skin.  Then it wiggles its way through the nerve fibers into the nuclei of nerve cells.  There they take up residence permanently, and the nerve cells become factories for new copies of the herpes virus.    During outbreaks of the disease, copies of HSV1 and HSV2 spill back out of the nerve cells and force their way through the skin to the outside world, causing the blisters and sores characteristic of herpes.   
Sometimes infected people shed viral particles only in small quantities that don't cause any symptoms.   In this case, they are carriers, who can give herpes to others without ever experiencing the disease themselves.  

Because of the potential for viral shedding, and the adaptability of both the HSV-1 and HSV-2 types, it is possible during oral sex for people with cold sores on the mouth to transmit the virus to the genitals of their partners.   Even fingers can have tiny sores called herpetic whitlows that infect others.   

To sum up, the herpes simplex virus does not always produce symptoms, but it can be extremely contagious, particularly during outbreaks when the body produces copies of the virus in such large quantities that they cause lesions -- sores or blisters on the skin.  An infected person in the midst of a herpes outbreak can only avoid infecting others by keeping the infected areas away from other people.  Kissing, touching or fondling areas with herpes-related sores is a surefire way to get infected.   

* This article is based on the information at http://www.cdc.gov/std/herpes/STDFact-herpes.htm, http://health.yahoo.com/sexualhealth-overview/genital-herpes-topic-overview/healthwise--te3043.html, http://www.herpes.org/, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herpes_simplex http://www.webmd.com/genital-herpes/default.htm