The officers make daily inspections and respond to resident’s complaints about mosquitoes, as part of their mosquito control procedure.
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Public Health England updated its travel advice overnight after the first cases of Zika transmitted by mosquitoes on the United States mainland.
Health officials said the USA might see small clusters of infections.
Until now, the infection – which is carried by mosquitos – has been mostly spread by travel to Latin America and the Caribbean, where the disease is most prevalent, or by sexual transmission.
“This means Florida has become the first state in the nation to have local transmission of the Zika virus”, Mr Scott said at a press conference.
The agency has told pregnant women to avoid travel to more than 50 other countries and territories where Zika is active.
The local health department is searching for other potential infections, with more than 2300 people tested so far, as well as ramping up mosquito control programs and is distributing Zika protection kits to pregnant women at their doctors’ offices, Florida officials said. “What we have been doing is going out to the hotels and talking to the maintenance staff and educating them what to look for, because going out and mowing the grass and just keeping the place clean isn’t the same as looking for standing water”, said Terry Torrens, the county’s mosquito control director.
Zika virus infections in pregnant women are directly linked to fetal deaths and devastating birth defects such as microcephaly, when a baby is born with an abnormally small head, according to the CDC. Florida health officials said t.
“If I were a pregnant woman right now, I would go on the assumption that there’s mosquito transmission all over the Miami area”, said Dr. Peter Hotez, a tropical medicine expert at the Baylor College of Medicine.
The main species of mosquito known to spread Zika, the Aedes aegypti, is not believed to circulate in Missouri or IL.
Virtually anything that can hold water can be a breeding ground for mosquitoes. They say they’ve been anticipating and preparing for local Zika transmission – and that the news does not change their plans.
The reason: better insect control as well as window screens and air conditioning that should help curtail any outbreaks.
Pregnant women should avoid all non-essential trips to Florida because of the potential for contracting the Zika virus, United Kingdom officials have said, as thousands of Britons are expected to visit the popular tourist destination.
Roxanne Connelly said Friday that finding positive mosquitoes is like chasing a moving target. Fever, rash, joint pain and red eyes are the most common symptoms, but 80 percent of people who have the virus don’t show symptoms. At home? At work? “Where they were playing baseball?”
Despite urgings from health experts and the White House, Congress failed to pass a Zika funding bill before lawmakers left Washington for their summer recess earlier this month.
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The announcement comes several weeks after Congress adjourned without acting on President Obama’s request for $1.9 billion for Zika research, education and prevention.
