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US health officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced that 14 cases of possible Zika infections may have been caused by sexual intercourse including those that involved pregnant women.

According to the health agency, all 14 case involve men visiting countries where outbreaks are particularly and may have spread the virus to their sex partners after arriving home as mentioned in a report by Reuters.

While reports of such possibility have not been fully established by evidence, CDC is studying the various ways through which the virus could be transmitted.

"In two of the new suspected sexual transmission events, Zika virus infection has been confirmed in women whose only known risk factor was sexual contact with an ill male partner who had recently traveled to an area with local Zika virus transmission; testing for the male partners is still pending," CDC said in a statement as quoted by NBC News.

Scientists previously noted that Zika infection via sexual transmission is rare. In fact, only very few cases have been reported and confirmed. However, if all women in the foregoing possible Zika cases were tested positive, it will bring a new complex perspective to Zika's medical mystery linked to various neurological birth defects as well as paralysis.

"We were surprised that there was this number. If a number of them pan out, that's much more than I was expecting," said Dr. Anne Schuchat, the deputy director at the CDC as stated in a New York Times report.