Gardasil, Genital warts Transmission

[Joshua88]

Hi Doc,

It's me again. 10 months before, me and my fiance were treated for genital warts, we were both clear for 10 months.  Last february, we both decided to take the Gardasil Vaccine, we had the 1st two shots already and waiting for the last one.  A few weeks ago, i noticed a Wart in my penis.  I was surprised that the wart came back, i assumed that i would be clear considering the 10 months of no wart.  Now... Will the Gardasil vaccine will somewhat protect my fiance from me considering that she's clear?  I'm somewhat confused with the term HPV CLEAR, is it latent in your body or is it rid off by your body's immune system?  I might be reinfected, because i had an encounter with another girl a couple of months ago.  But i thought that once you were treated and was cleared with genital warts / hpv, you won't get the same virus again?  I got the wart treated yesterday and it's in for biopsy.  I'm just worried that i might have infected my fiance.  Will my fiance get infected with the wart right away if we had contact? or are there chances that she might not get it?  I'll practice abstinence in a while.  Thanks doc.

[Joshua88]

Thanks doc.  The 2nd statement gave me the relief that im looking for, i dont want to infect my gf again.  One last thing, if we're planning to have a baby, will my gf have wart recurrence automatically due to her being pregnant?

Im still waiting for the result of my biopsy.  Thanks again doc.  More power to you and to this forum.  It really gives people like me the answers we're looking for, than searching all over the net and get false informations.

[Edward W Hook, MD]

The HPV vaccine helps to prevent infection but if you somehow had a latent infection, it would not keep the infection from recurring.  Like you, I am a bit surprised that you suffered a recurrence after 10 clear months but stranger things have happened. You may have had a linger, subclinical infection.  Our knowledge/understanding is probabilistic and thus there are exceptions to the generalization (which still holds for most people) that if there is no recurrence for six months, one should consider themselves non-infectious.  

As for your GF, ant antibodies induced by the vaccine should protect her. She should finish the course of vaccination to achieve the full benefit of the vaccine.

Hope this helps.  EWH