Scientist accidentally passes insect virus to wife by sexual contact
A biologist has inadvertently made history after becoming the first person to pass on an insect-borne virus to another human by sexual contact.
Researcher Brian Foy contracted the Zika virus, which causes severe fatigue and joint pain, while on a field trip to Senegal.
Five days after his return he fell ill, followed by his wife Joy who started showing symptoms too.
The scientists were baffled as to what she had caught until a year later when, on a hunch, they carried out a battery of tests and concluded that sexual contact between the Foys was the most likely cause.
Accidental discovery: Brian Foy (right), pictured in Senegal with Kevin Kobylinski (left) and Massamba Sylla, inadvertently made history after becoming the first person to pass on an insect-borne virus to another human by sexual contact
Professor Foy and the co-authors of a new paper on the discovery believe it is the first instance of sexual transmission of a mosquito-born virus between humans.
Such a possibility has been explored before among animals, but not in humans.
Professor Foy, from the University of Colorado, and colleague Kevin Kobylinski, a Phd student, had been collecting mosquitoes in a south-eastern village of Senegal called Bandafassi, where they were often bitten.
Upon their return home in August 2008 they fell sick.
Their symptoms were extreme tiredness, swollen wrists, rashes and painful urination. Professor Foy had skin problems and what appeared to be blood in his semen.
A few weeks later Mrs Foy also fell ill with similar symptoms, along with extreme sensitivity to light.
Their four children were unharmed.
The Foys asked colleagues at the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention to try and identify which pathogen they had been infected with, but the best they could do was a guess at dengue fever, even though Professor Foy and Mr Kobylinski had been vaccinated against it.
'My wife wasn't happy with what happened afterwards'
It was not until a year later when Mr Kobylinski went for a beer with medical entomologist Andrew Haddow from the University of Texas while on another trip to Senegal that they had a breakthrough.
He suggested that Zika could be responsible and when they carried out tests on Mr Kobylinski and the Foys, it turned out his hunch was correct.
Science Now reported that while there was no direct evidence that Mrs Foy was infected by sexual contact, the ‘circumstantial evidence is strong’.
The website said that the species of mosquito that transmit Zika don’t live near their home in Colorado and the life cycle of the mosquito fitted with how events unfolded.
In a paper published in Emerging Infectious Diseases, Professor Foy added the crucial final piece to the puzzle: ‘Patients 1 and 3 (Mr and Mrs Foy) reported having vaginal sexual intercourse in the days after patient 1 returned home but before the onset of his clinical illness.’
Professor Foy added: ‘My wife wasn't happy with what happened afterwards.'
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