Urging people not to worry about the virus, he asked pregnant women to be careful about mosquito bites. People contract the virus when they are bit by an infected mosquito, and mosquitoes can become infected if they bite a person who has the virus.
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Those countries and territories are: Brazil, Colombia, El Salvador, French Guiana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Martinique, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Suriname, Venezuela, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Dominican Republic, Barbados, Bolivia, Ecuador, Guadeloupe, Saint Martin, Guyana, Cape Verde and Samoa.
Wolfe says if you haven’t traveled outside of the US over the past few months, you should have zero worry about contracting the Zika virus.
Hawaii Health Department officials say they’re also looking at ways to beef up staffing, just in case.
The mosquito-borne disease has been linked to thousands of severe birth defects in Brazil.
“A causal relationship between Zika virus infection and birth malformations and neurological syndromes has not yet been established, but is strongly suspected”.
Adults infected with Zika could have fever and a rash or conjunctivitis, but most people show no symptoms.
Legacy Community Health warned pregnant patients to avoid travel to countries on Centers for Disease Control’s Zika Virus warning list. Then it transmits the virus to other people through mosquito bites.
She spoke after a videoconference with five state governors and six Cabinet members to discuss the mosquito, which Brazilian researchers have linked to a seemingly sudden upsurge in cases of microcephaly, in which children are born with abnormally small heads.
On Monday, the World Health Organization meets to decide whether Zika should be treated as a global emergency.
Dr. Kurt Barnhart, chair of the Pennsylvania section of the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, said the virus isn’t to be taken lightly, but isn’t as serious as many fear.
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Nor is there any vaccine on the market yet against the dengue virus, which comes from the same family of flaviviruses.
