Many people are anxious about herpes, but it’s important to remember that it only affects the skin for relatively short periods of time, and most people only have a few recurrences. There is no cure for genital herpes, but medication can help manage and reduce the severity of symptoms, and also reduce the frequency of recurrences and reduce the risk of spread. It’s often not possible to tell when a person first acquired the HSV infection as the first symptoms may appear weeks to years later, if at all. It is estimated that about one in eight people have HSV 2 and about 80% of those infected may be unaware that they have HSV2. HSV2 occurs mainly in and around the genital area. HSV1 occurs more commonly around the mouth, but it can also occur on the genitals.
There are two forms of HSV – HSV1 and HSV2. Genital herpes is a common sexually transmissible infection (STI) caused by the herpes simplex virus (HSV).
