Traces of the coronavirus have been found in the semen of severely affected men, raising the possibility that the virus might be sexually transmitted, according to a new study form China.

Dr. Ryan Berglund, a urologist with the Cleveland Clinic’s Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute, told WebMD that it is not surprising to find the virus in semen since it has also been found in stool and other body fluids.

However, Berglund and infectious disease experts caution that this doesn’t mean the novel coronavirus disease is sexually transmitted.

“I think that’s premature,” he said.

However, Dr. Greg Poland, director of the Vaccine Research Group at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, told WebMD:

“To me, it raises a warning, and now we have to attend to that warning and do the research.”

He noted that the new study only detected traces of genetic material from the coronavirus.

“It doesn’t tell you that it’s a whole, viable, infectious virus,” Poland said. “If I ground up the virus and performed this test, it would be positive even though that virus had no infectious potential.”

Debby Herbenick, Ph.D., a professor at the Indiana University School of Public Health, told Men's Health that “finding the presence in semen is an important step toward subsequent research to better understand potential sexual transmission of COVID.”

Herbenick says that in light of this new evidence, men who are recovering from the disease and want to engage in partnered sex, would be wise to avoid certain kinds of sex or wear condoms for a period of time until the virus has cleared their system.