Ask the doctor: After a vasectomy, can I transmit STDs?
What you need to know:
- A man who has had a vasectomy will not cause pregnancy but fluids from the seminal vesicle, prostate and Cowper’s glands, which a woman will be exposed to will instead cause STDs if the man has them and is not practising safe sex.
Before I had a vasectomy six years ago, my wife and I were tested for HIV and found to be negative. However, I have now tested positive. Can I transmit the virus to her? Alley
Dear Alley,
Semen is made up of five percent sperm,65 percent seminal vesicle fluids and around 30 percent prostatic fluid. The Cowper’s glands or the bulbo urethral glands produce the pre-cum fluids to wash the urethra of acidic urine and help in lubrication during sex.
Tubes referred to as the vas deferens carry sperms from the testes to mix with the said seminal vesicle and prostate fluids, to exit the penis as semen, which since it carries sperms, is responsible for causing pregnancy.
A vasectomy is an operation to prevent pregnancy by blocking or cutting the vas deferens tubes. This means that a man who has had a vasectomy will not cause pregnancy but fluids from the seminal vesicle, prostate and Cowper’s glands, which a woman will be exposed to will instead cause STDs if the man has them and is not practising safe sex.
So, if you have had a vasectomy, you will produce pre-cum and fluids from seminal vesicles or the prostate which, if one has an STD or HIV, will be transmitted to their sexual partner.
Please use a condom during sexual intercourse and immediately go to your HIV counsellor for counselling and a referral to a doctor for better management of your problem. You should go with your wife who should be checked for HIV and other STDs, apart from both of you being counselled about the new problem.
What causes sugar in one’s urine?
I am a diabetic and receiving treatment. However, recently, I was told that there is sugar in my urine. Why? John Paul
Dear John Paul,
The kidneys make urine by filtering blood and making sure that important substances in the filtered water, including glucose, are retained by the body and wastes removed, hence appearing in urine. When there is excessive sugar in one’s blood (above 180 mgs%) it will overwhelm the kidneys and the sugar will appear in urine.
Too much sugar in blood and, therefore, urine may happen in someone with diabetes although sometimes this can also happen in someone who is pre-diabetic ( one whose fasting blood sugar is 100 to 125 mg/dL but not high enough to be diagnosed as diabetic). Such a person then requires to take dietary and other lifestyle measures to delay the onset of likely diabetes.
Sugar in urine can also be caused by other non-high blood sugar conditions including an inherited condition in which the filtering mechanism of the kidneys allows sugar to pass through into the urine.
Some people, especially children and pregnant women, may have sugar in urine even when they do not have diabetes because their kidneys even when the sugar is normal, may not properly remove sugar from forming urine (have a low renal threshold of less than 120 mg % of blood glucose).
Medical conditions including where the kidneys leak protein (Nephrotic syndrome and a kidney transplant) may also lead to glucose in urine.
Today, a new drug for treatment of diabetes known as gliflozins can cause one to urinate out excess sugar, hence sugar appearing in urine yet sugar in blood is normal. If gliflozins are the drugs you are taking for diabetes and they are working well, then it is normal to have sugar in urine but not in the blood.
