Cold sore triggers vary from person to person, but HSV is an opportunistic infection. That means it rears its ugly head when, for whatever reason, your immune system is too weak to HERPES VIRUSES reactivation Sequence of events** When a person is suffering from chronic stress, excess Cortisol and Adrenaline lowers their Glutathione. Glutathione is the body's most important antioxidant. Insufficient Glutathione reduces the How Herpes Virus Reshapes the Human Genome To Spread Technology Networks EpsteinBarr virus infection controls the concentration of the intracellular antioxidant glutathione by upregulation of the glutamate transporter EAAT3 in tumor cells