Changing partners is useless.
Patients do not react to the sperm itself, but to the fluid containing the sperm, called seminal plasma. In principle, your immune system behaves as in the case of hay fever: it detects a harmless substance as a pathogen, which leads to a violent overreaction.
In hay fever, certain pollen proteins are responsible. In the case of semen allergy, the causative agent remained unknown for a long time. Only a few years ago, dermatologist and allergist Johannes Ring discovered it. Ring and his team identified the protein responsible: prostate-specific antigen (PSA), which is produced by the prostate.
Since PSA is present in every man’s sperm, changing sexual partners is not a solution: the allergy is not specific to certain individuals. On the other hand, it seems to be a very rare immune reaction, with only a hundred cases documented worldwide since 1958.
Imprecise concept, but the problem is solvable.
About half of the cases also involve other types of allergies. Moreover, a large number of cases go unreported, as many people find it embarrassing to even mention the problem. However, since 2005, records have been accumulating, and there is data indicating that in the United States alone there are between 20,000 and 40,000 people with a semen allergy.
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