[ WP ] A man 's wife is dying of cervical cancer , while he struggles with admitting to an affair that gave her HPV .

Not a response to your prompt, but just a bit of information ( although I'm not a doctor or an expert, so please feel free to look up the info yourself ) - HPV is the most common STD ( it is estimated that virtually everyone will catch it at some point in their lifetime ), and that's largely because it's very difficult to detect in women, and more or less impossible to detect in men ( barring an outbreak ). It can remain dormant for long periods of time, and usually does n't cause any negative affects. In something like 95 % of cases, nothing happens. 
 
 In the other 5 % of cases... HPV is warts. Not just genital warts, but all warts. If you have a wart, you have HPV. And while, in a minority of these cases, HPV *can* lead to cancer, it is a variety of cancer that can usually be diagnosed and treated if it's found early enough. 
 
 In order for the premise of your story to actually happen: 
 
 1. The man would have to know the person he had an affair with had HPV while he was active with her. This is possible, but it prompts the question, `` why would you do it if you knew?'' 
 
 2. The man would have to have reason to believe he had caught the HPV. Without having any symptoms, this is pretty much impossible. 
 
 3. The man would have to know he caught the HPV from the person he had an affair with, instead of some other person, possibly even before he met his wife. This is pretty much impossible. 
 
 4. The man would have to know he still had HPV when he was with his wife. Again, without symptoms, impossible to know for sure. 
 
 5. The man and his wife would have had to have had ( probably sexual ) contact without the wife knowing he had HPV. If he had symptoms, this seems a bit unlikely. 
 
 6. The man would have to know the HPV came from him, and not from some other partner of hers, possibly even one she had before she met him. This is also pretty much impossible. 
 
 Sorry, I'm not trying to kill your story idea here, but HPV is one of those things that seems to cause a lot more alarm than it probably needs to, and I think that's largely because people do n't really understand how it works.
