what is the difference between a cold sore and herpes?
i was on Google and i came across a picture of a cold sore and another of herpes and they seem to look the same to me.so how would some one know the difference.
Tagged with: cold sore • google • herpes
Filed under: Herpes Cold Sore Virus
Herpes simplex describes a cluster of "diseases" that are all related to the same virus- Chicken pox is one, cold sores and canker sores are another, shingles another (technicaly a second chicken pox outbreak) and the STD of herpes is another.
So, you are correct in that they look the same, they are just different "strains" of the same virus.
Just like the influenza virus comes in at least 2 strains that I know of, A & B- it’s why it takes so long for the flu vaccine to come out each year- the scientists must decide which strain will be active before producing the vaccine.
Hope this helps.
Since I got thumbs down for telling the truth, here’s a link to the REAL facts as stated above.
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/herpessimplex.html
Surely you folks will believe what’s coming from the National Institue of Health.
The herpes virus lives in our body. One of the places it exists is around the lips. When irritated, with high fever, and sometimes with a cold, it may become activated and shows itself as a sore.
So, a cold sore is herpes. If it becomes in contact with other lips, nipples, and vagina or penis, it may be transfered.
Lip sores that are Herpes are usually confined to the lips, although they are related to the gential herpes.
Still, I believe in some way they are not very related because I don’t know of anyone who has gotten gential herpes from a lip sore; although I suppose it can be transferred there.
They both respond to the same anti-viral medication; and they both are recurring your whole life; it’s a virus that never goes away.
In a nutshell; I would not be wary of a person who has lip herpes or cold sores; I wouldn’t be afraid of catching it except maybe on my lips; on the other hand having herpes on your private parts is definitely transferrable in many circumstances, even when no ’sore’ is visible.
OMG…Diane B is an idiot. Don’t listen to her!! Go to http://www.ashastd.org and read about herpes for heaven’s sake. Cold sores ARE a form of herpes, and highly contagious, and if you have an active case on your lips or in your mouth and have oral sex, it’s highly probable that you will then infect your partner on the genitals. It’s one of the two normal ways of transferring the infection…the other being genital to genital. God people…do your homework before you start offering up advice. Ignorance is not bliss at all…it’s irresponsibility.
They are the same. Exactly the same.
The ONLY difference is the location.
There are two herpes viruses, but either can infect either place.
95% of cold sores (oral herpes) are caused by the virus hsv-1. 5% are caused by hsv-2.
50-70% of genital herpes is caused by the virus hsv-1, the same one that causes most cold sores. The rest are cuased by hsv-2.
If you have genital herpes, if it is caused by hsv-1 it will typcially be a milder infection than if you had hsv-2 (slightly fewer outbreaks).
If you have oral herpes, it will recur much more frequently if caused by hsv-2 than if it was caused by hsv-1.
In order of infectiousness, oral hsv-1 is the most infectious, then genital hsv-2, then genital hsv-1 and finally oral hsv-2 is the least infectious.
Symptoms are identical.
I have genital herpes caused by hsv-1, caught from a partner who got cold sores giving me oral sex. That is actually the most common way to catch genital herpes among young women these days.