The warning comes because health officials are concerned about a strong link between Zika virus infection during pregnancy and a birth defect called microcephaly, in which babies are born with abnormally small heads and face lifelong cognitive impairments.
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This week, it was announced a pregnant woman in Spain who had travelled to Colombia has the virus – in what is thought to be the first such case in Europe.
The announcement was made on Friday by Paulo Gavel, president of Brazil’s world-renowned public health research institution Ossa Crud Foundation (Fisc), Xinhua news agency reported. “20.3 million people live in our state; I think we’re going to have 100 million people visit this year”. Gadelha underscored that the discovery needn’t alter Carnival plans for anyone but pregnant women.
Now, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued some interim guidelines on how to prevent transmitting the virus sexually. The CDC is now telling doctors to test the women for Zika between two and 12 weeks after they get back to the U.S., Frieden said. Tests on cell cultures showed the virus in the samples was capable of damaging the cells, meaning it was active.
“We are quite literally discovering more about Zika each and every day”, Frieden said.
There is no vaccine for Zika virus.
“It may be that it’s present in saliva”. However, the World Health Organization on Thursday advised countries not to accept blood donations from people who have been in Zika-prevalent countries. “They should practice safe sex”, said Thompson.
The guidance also suggests the men might consider abstaining or using condoms even with a partner who isn’t pregnant.
“We have established here at the State Department a Zika coordination team and a broader working group to ensure a robust and coordinated department response”, Kirby stated on Friday.
The guidelines were in response to the report Tuesday by Dallas health officials who said a local resident was infected with the Zika virus by having sex with a person who had contracted the disease while traveling in Venezuela.
“The Zika infection is only transmitted via Aedes mosquitoes and not by human-to-human contact, except possibly, very rarely, by sexual mean”, he said.
The CDC’s counterpart in England, Public Health England, has recommended that women whose partners have traveled to a Zika-affected area avoid getting pregnant for 28 days after a male partner’s return, assuming he is not showing symptoms of the disease. Several Latin American nations have urged women to postpone pregnancies.
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“Right now, one case is not enough to really justify saying that it’s a sexually transmitted disease”, said Gino Solla, Director of the Ector County Health Department.
