He wants to donate a kidney to his wife and discovers that she is his sister.

It’s a completely incredible story that was told on the American community website Reddit. A man indeed confided thata medical test revealed a shocking secret about his family. And the Web was set ablaze by reading his words. He therefore explained that he had been happily married for six years when his wife fell ill after the birth of their second child. To cure her, she needed a kidney transplant. Since no member of his family was compatible for a donation, he decided to get tested to see if he could be a donoralthough compatibility between spouses is generally rare.

According to the test results, the father of the family had a genetic compatibility “exceptionally high” with his wife. One of the tests carried out to determine if they were compatible was to assess the degree of genetic similarity of the couple. Their level of concordance then suggested that they might, in fact, be genetically related. The man, who was adopted as a baby, has no information about the identity of his biological family. His wife can therefore be his sister.

Question time

The question that the father of the family asked himself consisted in whether he should push the genetic tests to determine if he and his wife are half-brothers and half-sisters or cousins. Likewise, should they test their two (perfectly healthy) children for possible genetic diseases that are more common in children whose parents are closely related? And should they share information with the parents of the young woman? Especially since, for the moment, it is the health of women that remains everyone’s priority. A user replied to the father of the family: “Give him a kidney, do a vasectomy, go to therapy and keep this a secret until the grave. I think the kids need to be told, but if not, who else needs to know (apart from Reddit)?” It remains to digest the information and make decisions.