Former Pro Wrestling Champion Paralyzed

In total, he spent more than 10 months in the hospital and needed six months of intense rehab to recover. Caruso was shocked by how a mosquito bite completely transformed his life and almost killed him. It’s something that he’s still recovering from with progress slow and difficult. He said, “When I arrived at Gouverneur, I was still in a lot of pain and questioning why this was happening to me. I was discouraged and didn’t care about getting better.”

After getting bitten by a mosquito and contracting West Nile Virus, a former pro wrestling champion is battling a host of nasty symptoms. It turns out the insects, thanks to disease, can pack a mighty punch for their size.

That’s what wrestling champion Fabio Caruso, named as The Sicilian Slammer, found out. The 40-year-old was working in his yard in New York when a mosquito bit him last year. The wrestling champ was already recovering from a kidney transplant at the time. So, he wasn’t in the best of health. West Nile quickly ravaged his body and turned into a severe infection.

Caruso ended up in the ICU at NYU Langone. The wrestling champion had both respiratory failure as well as lower-body paralysis. Doctors had to put him on a ventilator to save his life since he couldn’t breathe on his own. Even after things became less touch and go, Caruso experienced memory loss and a recurring fever for months.