Texas: According to media reports, a Texas woman has apparently contracted HIV through sexual contact with another woman, the Centres for Disease Control reported on Thursday, a rare female to female transmission of the virus.
Testing confirmed the 46 year old woman with newly diagnosed HIV “had a virus virtually identical to that of her female partner, who was diagnosed previously with HIV and who had stopped receiving antiretroviral treatment in 2010,” according to the CDC’s Weekly Morbidity and Mortality Weekly report, a CNN report said.
“HIV transmission through female to female sexual contact “has been reported rarely and is difficult to ascertain,” officials were quoted as saying in the report. Past confirmation of such transmission “has been difficult because other risk factors almost always are present or cannot be ruled out,” the report said.
“In this case, other risk factors for HIV transmission were not reported by the newly infected woman, and the viruses infecting the two women were virtually identical.”
The CDC said it was contacted by the Houston department of health about the case in August 2012.
The woman newly diagnosed with HIV did not report any other risk factors, such as injection drug use, tattooing, transfusions or transplants, officials said. The woman is believed to have been infected by her 43 year old sexual partner, the CDC said. She told officials the woman was her only sexual partner six months before she tested positive.
