Medical experts stunned after the child has contracted HIV from his father in the strangest way

A recent case proves that HIV can be transmitted in an extremely bizarre and unexpected way. After several years of investigation, scientists across the United States and Portugal have discovered that a four-year-old child diagnosed with HIV in 2013 was probably infected with a light bulb that was leaking on his father's arm while he had only one day.

The case remained secret for some time, as the main source of the virus was not found. HIV can be transmitted in multiple ways and most often, the virus is usually transmitted by certain body fluids such as blood, sperm, pre-seminal fluid, rectal fluids, vaginal secretions and breast milk. a person infected with HIV.

These fluids can be transmitted through sexual intercourse, breastfeeding and other intimate physical contact. However, in the case of the child from Portugal, there was no sign of unusual physical contact. Since her mother was HIV-1 negative, there was no chance that the child could get her from her mother.

There were also no signs of episodes of prior sexual abuse. However, researchers in Portugal, accompanied by an expert in phylogenetics in the United States, have mapped HIV samples from both father and son. The analysis led to the conclusion that the infection had been transmitted to the boy by an open ampoule on the father's skin. Dr. Thomas Leitner, an expert in phylogenetics at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, told the Daily Mail: "This is a very unusual case. It shows us that this is not something that will have a significant impact on the HIV epidemic. that there are unusual means of transmission. "

Although this is undoubtedly one of the most singular cases that Leitner has ever known, it is certainly a revelation for Nuno Taveira, the microbiologist from Lisbon, co-author of the article entitled "Transmission of HIV-1 from father to his son "During the period of seroconversion".

In his study, Taveira said, "Although mother-to-child transmission of HIV continues in many parts of the world and has been the subject of many phylogenetic investigations, few father-to-child transmission has been reported. reported. " Although it is common for the disease to be transmitted to the child by the mother, especially at the time of pregnancy, it was certainly one of the few cases where the father had transmitted the disease.