He noted viruses such as mumps, Ebola, Zika, SARS-COV-1 and other viruses also can infect tissues of the male genital tract and negatively impact fertility. Mumps infection is well known to potentially cause male sterility. “We just didn’t understand why it had this negative impact until this study,” Hope said. But scientists didn’t know the reason and wondered if the cause was fever and inflammation. The evidence that infection with SARS-CoV-2 can negatively impact male sexual health and fertility is increasing every day. “These results indicate that the testicular pain, erectile dysfunction, hypogonadism, reduced sperm count and quality, and decreased fertility associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection are a direct consequence of infection of cells of the male reproductive tract and not indirect mechanisms such as fever and inflammation,” Hope said.

“But the signal that jumped out at us was the complete spread through the male genital tract,” said lead investigator Thomas Hope, professor of cell and developmental biology at Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine. “We had no idea we would find it there.” Scientists didn’t know what they would find, but they expected to see the virus in the lungs and high up in the nose near the brain because people were experiencing loss of taste and smell. The surprising discovery was made utilizing a PET scan specially designed to reveal sites of infection spreading over time in a whole-body scan. The study, in SARS-CoV-2 infected-rhesus macaques, revealed the prostate, vasculature of testicles, penis and testicles were all infected with the virus. Multiple tissues of the male genital tract can be infected with SARS-CoV-2, reports a new Northwestern Medicine study in large animal models.

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