If their immune systems are good, then their antibodies should have an Extremely Good chance of protecting them from a genital infection, either from themselves or each other. (Assuming that they both have HSV-1, and since HSV-2 doesn't tend to have recurring outbreaks orally... HSV-1 is a good assumption.) Nothing is 100%, but antibodies are pretty potent. I have heard of one person on VP who did unfortunately get oral-to-genital auto-transmission (touched mouth, then touched genitals before the virus died), but that person identified as having a poor immune system at the time.
One of the things herpes does, though -- the naughty, crafty little bug(ger...) -- is depress the immune system a little, so it can have an outbreak. This is a good reason to do hand-washing when you know you've got an outbreak, so you don't auto-transmit it to yourself when your immune system is under attack. It's also just good not to tempt Murphy, and therefore abstain from giving oral sex when one is having an outbreak.
(And, regarding little kids? Just do NOT kiss their teeny eyelids at all. The risk/benefit of eyelid-kissing is pretty firmly on the side of "it will not do anything bad to you to refrain from even the slightest bit of exposure, but if a kid did get eye-herpes, that would be EXTREMELY BAD.")
For a more concrete bit of anecdata... I have oral herpes too, and my spouse "thinks he remembers having cold sores as a kid." Despite at least one occasion where oral funtimes were had and I then walked into the bathroom to realize that my lip had just swollen up like a balloon in the pre-blister stage... He's never evidenced any sores anywhere, oral or genital, in the over-20-years that I've known him.
(HSV can be tricky in penis-possessing-people, though -- if a mild outbreak happens in that long penile urethra, that can conceal the whole issue or make it seem like a UTI.)
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2012-09-05 03:28 am (UTC)One of the things herpes does, though -- the naughty, crafty little bug(ger...) -- is depress the immune system a little, so it can have an outbreak. This is a good reason to do hand-washing when you know you've got an outbreak, so you don't auto-transmit it to yourself when your immune system is under attack. It's also just good not to tempt Murphy, and therefore abstain from giving oral sex when one is having an outbreak.
(And, regarding little kids? Just do NOT kiss their teeny eyelids at all. The risk/benefit of eyelid-kissing is pretty firmly on the side of "it will not do anything bad to you to refrain from even the slightest bit of exposure, but if a kid did get eye-herpes, that would be EXTREMELY BAD.")
For a more concrete bit of anecdata... I have oral herpes too, and my spouse "thinks he remembers having cold sores as a kid." Despite at least one occasion where oral funtimes were had and I then walked into the bathroom to realize that my lip had just swollen up like a balloon in the pre-blister stage... He's never evidenced any sores anywhere, oral or genital, in the over-20-years that I've known him.
(HSV can be tricky in penis-possessing-people, though -- if a mild outbreak happens in that long penile urethra, that can conceal the whole issue or make it seem like a UTI.)
Hope that's helpful!