Can someone with HSV1 acquire HSV2 by giving oral sex?
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Are you asking if having one type of HSV affords protection from being infected by the other? – anongoodnurse Feb 22 '16 at 05:55
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Related (though not quite the same) : https://health.stackexchange.com/questions/1159/what-is-the-likelihood-of-contracting-genital-hsv1-through-oral-sex – YviDe Feb 22 '16 at 06:29
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HSV1 and HSV2 are different strains of the Herpes simplex virus. They both can lead to oral or genital infection.
The reason they are usually known as oral (HSV1) and genital (HSV2) herpes are that the majority of genital herpes cases used to be from HSV2. However, this has been changing and now HSV1 is the more dominant genital infection at least in some regions. Moreover, people can be infected by both, even in the same "region", though it's unlikely that most people even know whether they are infected by HSV1 or HSV2 because testing what strain someone is infected with not always done, from what I understand. So yes, someone with HSV1 can additionally acquire HSV2, both orally and genitally.
In addition to that, even a genital infection with HSV2 may lead to shedding the virus from the oral region - it is uncommon, though.
