About one STI test as an emigrant, a month of anxiety, fruitless doctor visits and hours of digging through scientific research

A month ago I got tested for all STIs, a microflora panel and HPV.

I got a positive result for HPV strains 16 and 18 — oncogenic, and the most aggressive among the oncogenic ones. The very one that can cause cervical cancer in women.

What's more, I read in one study that among women with cervical cancer, 97% of them had HPV 16/18. Once again, 97 percent!!

Being an anxious person in general, I immediately felt like a walking threat and a dangerous partner.

In my head I had already said goodbye to sex forever — like, well, I've screwed around plenty in my life, maybe that's enough.

At the same time I started reading research about HPV, from which I learned that the virus is sexually transmitted, and there's no treatment or protection against it, only vaccination. Sometimes it can go away on its own, in a year or two, or it may not — it all depends on the immune system. And most importantly — most people have one strain or another.

I decided to consult doctors, hoping they would give me more answers than the internet. Spoiler: they won't.

But I did get an amazing piece of advice from an infectious disease specialist: to have sex wearing two condoms (don't do that).

Out of confusion, I decided to take a quantitative test for all types of HPV, to at least understand how much of a threat I was to others. "Understand" subjectively, because no one told me any numbers, and I didn't find any research on it.

I took a quantitative test for all the most common types of HPV and... It came back negative for everything. Including strain 16/18.

At this point I was completely lost. And I booked another appointment with a dermatovenereologist, this time via telemedicine. A very experienced woman assured me that if the virus isn't detected, then everything is fine.

But... She didn't reassure me. After worrying for another week, I went to get tested again and got another negative result.

From which I drew two possible conclusions. Either the HPV cleared up in those three weeks between the first and second swab (lol), or the lab gave a false positive result the first time.

After talking about it with friends, I learned that false positives aren't rare locally, and the equipment for detecting the virus appeared here relatively recently.

What I took away from this story: don't diagnose yourself based on one test, and remember that false positives happen.

Wishing everyone health, attentiveness to yourself and your partner, and great safe sex!