can warts appear ten years after infection

Is this really true. Can you have had wart virus dormant in your body for ten years and not infect anyone else, then it just appears and you get visible warts which you can then infect others with? So potentially a very long term relationship could have one partner develop warts out of the blue with the other one not being infected. Obviously once the warts are visible the other partner would be at risk of infection. Can people clarify this for me please? I really need to know this. Thanks.

[danielle491]

This is a question I would love answers to also. My doctor recently told me that for every person it is different. Some people have them once and then never again and some people can get them many years later out of the blue. I, however, am not a doctor, and I have been wart free for a year and a half and am terrified of them coming back. Every web site says something different....

[soscared872]

I would like Dr. Handsfield or Dr. hook to answer that question. I did read on other sites that if your immunity gets too low, say from some auto-immune disease, the HPV could come out of it's dormancy. But I am not sure if it is the low risk HPV that produces warts.

The fact is that it is very rare for HPV to come out of it's dormancy. The other web sites are sensationalizing HPV and scaring people.

If you generally keep a very healthy diet and plenty of rest and exercise, your immune system will be very strong. You would be able to know if your immune system is strong when your next colds are very mild in symptoms. I also drink green tea a lot to help my immunity. My assumption is that I have cleared high risk HPV into the dormancy state, and I want to keep it there.

[puzzle2779]

If it lays dormant for years before producing warts, can you pass it on to other people or is it only contagious once it activates and produces the warts. To be honest with all the conflicting things I've read, I think I'm of the opinion that anything is possible-regardless of what doctors may say!

[soscared872]

Yeah I agree with you, puzzle! So much conflicting reports. It is too difficult to separate facts from sensationalism. You wonder what type of social agenda is behind the sensationalism. Best dourness are the doctors here and also the CDC web site.

I think The doctors here claim you are not contagious unless the virus is active. Active means "not dormant." if you have visible warts, the virus is active. However, Iam not sure how I, a guy, can tell if I have deactivated high risk HPV "down there." I think I need to get more education on that question myself.

[soscared872]

Sorry, I am using an iPad..."dourness"= "sources."

[puzzle2779]

Thanks. If this is true then if someone had the same partner for over three years (the time quoted to ensure the virus is cleared even if no warts ever appeared, is that right?) and then slept with a new partner then the new partner couldn't get warts? Would this be right? Or on the flip side-if a couple were in a long term relationship and one person developed warts out of the blue could it be it had been dormant and just surfaced due to being run down and then potentially spread it to the other partner? Trying to figure out how this all works-but everything i read, even answers on here, aren't clear and often contradicting. Thanks for posting your thoughts though!

[soscared872]

First question...the new partner could not get HPV from you if you cleared the virus into the dormancy state and stays in the dormant state, as far as I understand.

Second, if a couple has been together for years and monogamous and loyal to each other, one of them may have had long dormant HPV and get very sick from some unrelated illness. His immune system is overtaxed. The HPV that was dormant might reactivate and infect the other partner. However, events such as this deactivation are very rare.

I read of accounts where someone had warts appear after they got the flue.

This, to me, is why it is important for us to try best to keep a strong immune system. I personally eat more servings of vegetables a day, drink a lot of green tea, cut back my alcohol to below moderate, drink more water, stopped drinking soda a year ago, try getting 8 hours sleep a night, and exercise to a sweat six days a week. My last cold, which was last week, was my mildest ever, so I could tell my vegetarianism, which I recently adopted, strengthened my immune system. Actually, I am a five day per week vegetarian. If I was seven days, I would be stronger!

[puzzle2779]

Thanks for your comments. So basically if no warts are presents or no warts have been present for three years then you can't pass it on?

[soscared872]

Bottom line, I say you cannot pass on the HPV that gave you warts After all those warts are gone as long as your doctor cannot detect them.. Keep in mind, most of the HPV viruses that show up as warts are "low risk" HPV, meaning they are not cancer-causing. The invisible warts are mostly high risk HPV, which includes about a known dozen that can lead to cancer. There are tests for high risk HPV for women, but not for men. You won't know if high risk HPV is active in your throat until your alert dentist or ENT doctor detects it. Fortunately, after you clear high risk HPV, its reoccurrence is RARE, notwithstanding what the sensationalist web sites say!

[puzzle2779]

Thank you.