You are your safest sex partner during Covid-19

It’s a hard time for lovers.

In these highly uncertain and highly anxious times we are living in, where a mere touch or kiss could expose you to the deadly Covid-19 coronavirus, many may be wondering how safe it is to even be intimate with a partner.

City Press spoke to sexologist Marlene Wasserman, popularly known as Dr Eve, this week on how to navigate sexual and intimate relationships during the time of Covid-19.

Sex and trauma

“This Covid-19 outbreak is definitely a traumatic event,” Wasserman said. Her work in interpersonal neurobiology makes it clear to her that “our brains are responding in a way that is ‘very typical’ of trauma”.

“People respond differently to trauma. From a neurobiological point of view, people go into different responses – fight, flight or freeze,” she explained.

And trauma definitely has an impact on sex and intimacy.

A 2009 study published in the International Journal of Gynaecology and Obstetrics on the reproductive health of women after the massive and traumatic 2008 Wenchuan earthquake in the Sichuan province of China – registering 8.0 on the Richter scale – recorded findings of decreased satisfaction among women with their sex lives.

Gynaecologists surveyed 170 women using a questionnaire enquiring about symptoms of reproductive tract infections, menstrual disorders, satisfaction with their sexual lives and desire for fertility.

Researchers noted that the women’s satisfaction with their sexual lives decreased markedly after the earthquake.

At least 89.4% of them said they would not pursue a plan to become pregnant, and 67.1% said they would request pregnancy termination if they did conceive.

Wasserman explained: “Some people go into a state of high anxiety, hyperalertness and complete vigilance. In that survival mode they have a low interest in being sexual because all the energy of their brain goes into keeping them alive.

"Other people, seeking comfort, turn to being sexual to feel safe and secure.”

She said research was also showing that the nature of intimacy in couples also changed in times of conflict or trauma – moving from having to perform the act out of duty for some, to a new intensity in those relations.

“I’m working a lot around that with couples where some have different ways of handling trauma.

"One may be more needy and gets comfort from knowing where the other person is all the time, while the other could need more detachment, time out and privacy, and so be unable to manage the other person’s anxiety. Couples need to learn how to tolerate those differences in each other during times of trauma,” she said.

But should people be having sex at all, given that we know that the virus is primarily transmissible through respiratory droplets produced when someone sneezes or coughs, and can live on surfaces for several hours or days?

“Covid-19 is highly transmissible through touch and we can get it via saliva drops. Therefore, you really can’t avoid getting it if you are being sexual with somebody who is infected,” Wasserman said.

This was the reason experts were recommending being sexual only with someone living with you under lockdown.

“So anyone outside of that – including new partners or extra partners – is really unsafe, because you have a high risk of getting infected.

Read: Reconnect with your partner in lockdown

"We also know that a person who is asymptomatic can still pass on the virus. And we know that if people are symptomatic with Covid-19 under lockdown, they should be under quarantine in a separate room because they need to be safe from any touch,” she added.

New York state, the epicentre of America’s Covid-19 outbreak, had recorded more than 7 000 deaths by Thursday.

New York City’s health department encouraged self-pleasure in a guide last month, titled Sex and Coronavirus Disease, stating: “You are your safest sex partner.”

Wasserman said the pandemic also presented couples with a really important opportunity to discuss their values and to create new agreements to build trust.

“I think it’s a good time for couples to be talking about what they value in a relationship.

"Do you value honesty, do you value trust? How do we establish that when we’re released back into the world?

"It’s important to know that you haven’t been taking unnecessary risks, you have been socially distancing and you have been quite rigid in protecting yourself so as to not get infected or pass along the infection. This can be a new condition of being sexual.”

She added: “It’s going to be a big problem if you are cheating and you’ve got somebody else that you can’t wait to be sexual with after lockdown. Are you ethically or morally going to feel okay to go out there and do that, and then come back home to your family?”

Vuyo Mkize Health journalist | City Press

+27 11 713 9001 vuyo.mkize@citypress.co.za Media Park, 69 Kingsway Road, Auckland Park

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