A topic that bothers some. In men, the coronavirus could have effects on their sexual health. It would cause erectile dysfunction in some patients, or even a shrinkage of their penis.
In the United States, a 30-year-old man explained in a podcast published on the English-speaking site of Slate, that after being affected by a severe form of covid, his penis had shrunk. And this by at least four centimeters.
“It would be linked to the vascular damage caused by the disease, and my doctors say it’s probably permanent,” he explains to the journalist, saying that this event has damaged his self-confidence.
Asked by Slate, Charles Wellivern, urologist and director of Men’s Health at Albany Medical College in the United States indicates that when men suffer from erectile dysfunction, it can lead to shrinkage. Because “the penis does not stretch for a certain period, and it does not receive the necessary blood, which can lead to scarring and shortening of the penis”, also explains the American urologist Ashley G. Winter.
Proven erectile dysfunction
This symptom, which can make you smile, is nevertheless taken seriously by the doctors who have looked into the subject of erectile disorders following contamination with Covid-19.
In a study published in March 2021 in the journal Andrology, Italian researchers followed 100 sexually active men, 75 of whom had been infected with Covid-19. In people infected with SARS COV-2, the medical team finds “a higher prevalence of erectile dysfunction in men affected by the virus”. And they then suggest that vaccination and barrier gestures could “prevent sexual dysfunctions”.
Moreover, British urologists had called on men to respect barrier gestures and to be vaccinated in a video widely distributed on the Internet, because they were six times more likely to develop erectile dysfunction by being infected with covid- 19.