New research has indicated that using condoms may go some way to stopping the spread of the sexually transmitted infection, herpes. Scientists analysed data collected from several studies to see whether condoms could act as a barrier against the herpes virus passing between partners..
Previously, there had only been inconclusive results about how effective condoms were as protection against herpes. This pooled analysis was apparently the largest set of research to be done on how the spread of the Type II Herpes virus could be contained.
Overall, the researchers looked at statistics on 5,384 people who did not have herpes at the start of the 2 million-day-long period during which information gathered. By the end of that time period, 451 people had tested positive for the STI.
The researchers discovered that people who always used condoms when having sex reduced their chance of contracting herpes by 30%, while their chances of getting infected increased steadily each time they had unprotected sex. The results where the same regardless of whether the patient was male or female.
Writing in The Archives of Internal Medicine, the authors of the study said that though the “magnitude of protection” offered by condoms against herpes was not as great as observed with other STIs, they did offer moderate security for the sexually active against the herpes virus.