Home with your partner and hours of time ticking slowly by? As the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 continues to spread widely in the US and beyond, restrictions that promote social distancing do, too. By now, you may find yourself essentially quarantined at home with your partner. While this can be a wonderful time to connect with each other, you may have questions about how much intimacy is safe.
A refresher course on how the coronavirus spreads
Evidence shows that the virus spreads person-to-person through sustained close contact.
- The virus is carried in respiratory droplets transmitted by sneezing and coughing. If people are nearby, droplets might land in their mouths or noses or possibly be inhaled.
- Viral particles called aerosols may float or drift in the air when an infected person talks, sings, or breathes. People nearby may inhale aerosols.
- Research shows the virus can live on surfaces and may be spread when a person touches those surfaces, then touches their face.
- Whether an infected person sheds the virus in saliva, semen, or vaginal fluids isn’t known. Although the virus has been found in feces, transmission of the virus this way appears to be rare, if at all.
The definition of “sustained close contact” may change as we learn more, but running or walking by someone who has the virus is a lower risk scenario. Being in the same room as an infected person so that you’re breathing the same air for a while is a higher risk scenario. Expert opinion differs on what close contact entails and how many minutes of close contact is high risk. Generally, being within six feet of someone infected with the virus that causes COVID-19 for longer than a few minutes can put you at increased risk of getting the virus.
How safe is intimacy with a partner?
True, many forms of intimacy require a closer distance than the six feet of separation recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Yet this does not mean that you should isolate yourself from your spouse or partner and stop being intimate at all. If both of you are healthy and feeling well, are practicing social distancing and have had no known exposure to anyone with COVID-19, touching, hugging, kissing, and sex are more likely to be safe. Similarly, sharing a bed with a partner who is healthy should not be an issue.
Be aware, though, that the CDC reports that some people may have the virus and not yet have symptoms during the early part of the incubation period (presymptomatic). Additionally, some people never develop obvious symptoms of COVID-19 (asymptomatic). In either case, it’s possible that the virus might spread through physical contact and intimacy.
What about intimacy if one partner has been ill?
If you or your partner have been sick with COVID-19 and are now recovering, this CDC page explains ways to prevent the spread of germs,
