According to the report from The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Texas health officials on Zika virus infection, the first confirmed case in Dallas was sexually transmitted from one man to another, reported NBC News. “We are also launching further studies to determine whether children who have microcephaly born to mothers infected by the Zika virus is the tip of the iceberg of what we could see in damaging effects on the brain and other developmental problems”. The removal of any lingering doubt about the cause of the birth defects may help spur more intensive efforts to develop diagnostics and vaccines specific to Zika, which is closely related to dengue and other mosquito-borne viruses. Dr. John Brooks, from the CDC’s division of HIV/AIDS prevention, told STAT: “Were saliva an important mode of transmission, my expectation would be that we would have seen the epidemiology of cases evolve differently”, he said. Within the U.S., Zika is current circulating in Puerto Rico, the United States Virgin Islands, and American Samoa. The authors are from the Dallas County Health Department and the CDC.
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In January this year, the man had anal sex with his partner without a condom a day before, and a day after he began exhibiting the symptoms of Zika – a fever and purple rash.
“It is now clear that the virus causes microcephaly”, said CDC Director Tom Frieden.
Some travelers to areas with Zika will become infected while traveling but will not become sick until they return home and they might not have any symptoms.
The March of Dimes is urging congress to provide immediate new funding to fight the spread of the Zika virus. When researchers unleashed the virus on balls of neural stem cells, which is a model for embryonic brain development, Zika destroyed them within a few days.
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WHO on February 1, 2016, declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern regarding clusters of microcephaly cases and neurological disorders in some areas affected by Zika virus.
