The Aging Untold experts are tackling sexual health after 60, including how it has changed over the years and how to stay protected. Dating and intimacy can support emotional and physical well-being, whether someone is divorced, widowed, remarried or dating again for the first time in decades.
"You can't tell by looking at someone if they have a sexually transmitted disease," Rogers said. "Just because you retired, your sexual health didn't." Condoms do more than prevent pregnancy, and prevention options have changed over the decades, including for HIV. Human papillomavirus, or HPV, is the most common sexually transmitted disease, Rogers said. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the virus can cause cancer later in life.
Menopause is not a shield either. Gerontologist Sam Cradduck said plenty of people assume they can skip protection because pregnancy is off the table. "Menopause doesn't protect you from gonorrhea or syphilis or HIV or HPV," he said. Syphilis picked up at a younger age can show up later, and neurosyphilis has turned up in communities where older adults live, Cradduck said. Aging expert Amy O'Rourke said prevention starts with getting tested and talking with your partner.
Cradduck put syphilis bluntly: "That lives forever in you."