While the Ebola scare has died down significantly this past year, here’s another reason to keep your guard up: 155 days after a male survivor of the Ebola virus disease (EVD) tested negative for the virus, he was reportedly able to transmit the disease to a Liberian woman through unprotected sex. Though the woman passed away from the virus last March, the discovery of the virus’ sexual transmission was only uncovered recently.
This news is particularly unsettling considering that there are 17,000 people who have survived from the Ebola virus and who probably still carry it in their system. Reports of the deadly virus first surfaced last December 2013 in Guinea. According to data published in The New England Journal of Medicine, doctors discovered a “persistence of Ebola virus RNA in semen and declining persistence with increasing months since the onset of EVD.”
While the study notes that the longest period of time that the virus has been detected in a male’s semen is nine months after survival, it remains unclear if females can also be transmitters of the disease through unsafe sex.
Still, that’s no reason to be flippant about condoms, especially as the pull-out method gains popularity among couples.
Photo courtesy of IB Times
