Human Semen Can Carry At Least 27 Different Viruses

A new paper suggests that human semen makes a fertile home for dozens of viruses — many of which regularly top the world’s worst diseases list.

Some, of course, are obvious, like HIV. But a new analysis of a bevy of papers shows that human ejaculate can harbor Epstein-Barr, one of the nastier bugs that causes mono, as well as Ebola, Zika, Mumps, and plenty more.

Lead researcher, Alex Salam said, “Clinicians need to consider the possibility that traditionally non-sexually transmitted viruses can persist in semen, and this therefore raises the possibility of sexual transmission.”

That does not, of course, mean that any of these viruses can necessarily be transmitted through semen — after all, there are dozens of factors that play into that — but it is an important disease vector that Salam and others claim has largely been ignored by researchers. It’s also important to add that the analysis only looked at the presence of viral genes.

“Detection means that evidence of viral genetic material or viral protein was found in semen,” Salam told WebMD. “It’s important to note that this does not mean that the virus is viable, i.e., capable of replicating. To prove this, the virus needs to be isolated and grown in cells or animals. For many of the viruses, this test has not been done, so we don’t know whether virus is viable or not.”

There’s no telling, just yet, which of these bugs could actually be transmitted, and there’s a good chance we won’t know for a while. For now, though, don’t get too worried about these findings. Epstein-Barr, for example, while pretty serious at times is rather notoriously spread through saliva. And, chances are decent that in many cultures, if two people are having sex, they’ve also exchanged a bit of spit (yes, I’m intentionally making this as gross as possible). In those cases, it doesn’t matter, really, how well it can be transmitted through sex as it’s far, far more likely to find another way into its host.

Still, this is a nifty little discovery about one of the world’s most overlooked disease vectors.