Whether it’s your friend, family, work colleague, or even yourself, genital warts are not something that anyone wants to suffer from.
But while many people will contract genital warts at some stage in their life – with it being second only to chlamydia as the most common sexually transmitted infection (STI) in England – no one should suffer from it.
Genital warts can be treated and below I run through the different treatments available to men who have the infection.
These little skin lumps, bumps, growths, or alterations, are Human Papillomavirus (HPV). An HPV is a strain of more than a hundred different viruses, which cause warts to appear on your hand, foot, finger, or genital area.
90% of genital warts are caused by two distinct strains of HPV: type 6 and type 11.
As you would expect from the name, genital warts are found on your genitals and in your genital area. This means that you can find them:
Firstly, you must know that genital warts can’t be caught from kissing, hugging, or touching shared items (such as toilet seats, cutlery, or towels).
However, genital warts are transmitted through skin to skin contact via sexual intercourse. This covers a number of different activities and the NHS lists these as:
The only way to guarantee you won’t catch genital warts is to avoid all skin to skin contact, including sexual intercourse.
If you wish you reduce your chances of catching genital warts while having sex, wearing a condom will help to do this.
But you must bear in mind that condoms do not stop all skin to skin contact. So even during protected sex, there is still a chance of you catching genital warts.
If you find that you have a lump, bump, growth, or alteration on your body, and think it may be genital warts, there are plenty of examples of how they look which you can refer to.
A few such examples can be found here and here.
Alternatively, you can read more about genital warts symptoms here.
If you have genital warts there are a number of treatments available to help:
Genital warts aren’t something that you’re likely to be bringing up during your next dinner party. But that doesn’t mean that you should never speak about them.
Get in contact with a professional and decide which course of treatment is best for you, and make sure that your genital warts no longer cause you to suffer.
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