I recently found out my sister has chronic Hep b, likely from birth (she is adopted so different birth moms). Two of my three kids (ages 8 and 6) have not received the vaccine because my oldest had a life threatening reaction to her third dose as an infant, so her doctor recommended we wait til older for her siblings.
Now I’m panicking a bit that they haven’t been vaccinated. We see my sister about 5 times a year (she lives out of town) and she says her viral load is so low, it’s like being undetectable and very, very unlikely to transfer. Her husband has not gotten the virus from her and neither did her siblings growing up to our knowledge (we have all been tested multiple times due to pregnancy etc). Assuming she had it then of course.
Yesterday, we were about to say bye after her visit to us and finishing a meal. I noticed she had just picked a bump on her face, making a slight bit of blood visible-or really just you could see the red inflammation like it you picked a small pimple. I tried to just have us wave bye to her, but she hugged all 3 of my kids and kissed them on their heads (on hair). Meaning potentially her finger had blood from where she picked the bump, and the bump was right next to her mouth, so likely could have had small transfer from kissing their heads. I immediately panicked and brought them home. They all bathed or showered right then. No visible scratches or broken skin anywhere near where she touched. Maybe a small scratch on the very bottom of one daughter’s leg. So my question- is this an actual risk with no broken skin? Could the bath water have somehow moved the small viral particles down to an open wound on my daughter’s leg? Even that sounds crazy to me- it was a bath full of water- can’t imagine any virus could infect when that diluted, but my mind is playing tricks on me. Can someone ease my mind on this? Was any of this potential transmission? I will look into starting the vaccines and potentially testing them, but it wouldn’t do any good to test yet if this has any potential to transmit. These are my babies and I’m worried. It is also their aunt who will always be part of their lives. Should I chill about this situation and just make a plan going forward?