A second pregnant woman has been diagnosed with the mosquito-borne Zika virus in Australia, officials said Friday, adding that the disease was acquired overseas and there was no public health risk.
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Federal health officials say they have not confirmed a correlation between the virus and the condition “microcephaly”, in which infants are born with unusually small heads.
Zika, which is carried by mosquitos, has spread rapidly through Latin America and the Caribbean, with multiple governments in the most affected areas urging women to avoid getting pregnant for the time being. The mosquito that carries the Zika virus, aedes aegypti, has “a cousin here in NY called the Asian Tiger”, she said.
“We could have a pandemic in the Americas with four million people infected by the Zika virus”.
State health officials have confirmed Maryland’s first case of the Zika virus.
The doctors met behind closed doors and discussed how to provide blood tests to individuals who show symptoms of the disease – fever, rashes, joint pain and reddened eyes. Venezuela alone has had about 5,000 cases of suspected Zika virus in the last few months. Prior to Ohio’s new cases, the CDC had reported 52 travel-associated cases of Zika virus in 16 states and the District of Columbia, an increase from 35 cases in 12 states since Tuesday. In the past, Zika was considered a nuisance virus.
In February, the World Health Organization declared the Zika outbreak an global public health emergency, as it’s spreading like wildfire.
Brazilian Health Minister Marcelo Castro has announced a new partnership with scientists at the University of Texas that could lead to laboratory development of a vaccine within a year.
The road to developing a preventative shot against the disease is strewn with hurdles, however, not least because the group viewed as most at risk are pregnant women.
Castro said the ministry hopes to distribute tests soon that could be used to speed up diagnoses of patients with active symptoms of Zika, dengue and Chikungunya, another related viral infection.
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The first cases were reported in Brazil in May 2015.
