USA health officials said Zika remains a public health threat in Puerto Rico, with more cases expected throughout 2016.
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CDC officials reported the case Friday in the agency’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Review.
A man infected with Zika virus in Puerto Rico has died from complications of the infection, health officials said Friday.
The man suffered from fatal internal bleeding less than 24 hours after seeking medical attention, according to the report.
Sharp said the man had appeared to recover from his infection, but then developed a particular type of thrombocytopenia called immune thrombocytopenic purpura, or ITP, in which the man’s immune system attacked the platelets in his blood, leading to a clotting disorder.
Over 6,000 specimens have been tested since the finding of Puerto Rico becoming the first United States jurisdiction to report a death related to the Zika virus, showing that the island has 707 confirmed Zika cases, including 89 pregnant women with symptoms of the virus and one death. Some children whose mothers were infected with Zika during pregnancy have been born with microcephaly, a serious birth defect which causes a baby’s head to be smaller than average.
Previously, Colombia reported three deaths among Zika patients who had symptoms consistent with ITP, Sharp said.
Symptoms include fever, rash, joint or muscle pain and conjunctivitis.
“The availability of our new molecular Zika test provides physicians broad access to a diagnostic tool for managing the Zika outbreak”, said Rick L. Pesano, MD, PhD, vice president of research and development of Quest Diagnostics. CDC also says pregnant women should consider postponing travel to any area where the virus is being transmitted.
The Zika virus-infected patients resided in 50 of 78 municipalities in Puerto Rico.
Napa County last month reported the North Bay’s first confirmed Zika case – a pregnant woman who had recently traveled to Central America. But since only about one in five people who are infected will get sick, and because the illness is usually mild, many people may never know they have it, according to CDC.
A similar condition to the bleeding associated with Zika virus has also been found in some patients.
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With the Zika virus spreading and new research confirming that the Zika fever could be directly linked to Guillane-Barre Syndrome (a neurological disease that causes rapid paralysis in the victim), better testing clearly could not come soon enough.
