President Obama asked Congress for $1.9 billion in emergency funding for Zika in February. Additional programs – such as Zika testing, Zika kits and lab services – are being run by the state government and counties do not receive money for them. As a precaution, the Suncoast Blood Bank has been screening out potential donors who have traveled to Zika-affected countries within 28 days of blood donation, and earlier this week announced they would test every donor for the Zika virus. The most vulnerable members of the population to the virus remain pregnant women and their unborn children and it has been confirmed that the virus can be transmitted through sexual contact. “DNA or gene-based vaccines induce antibodies, but they also can activate the cell-mediated immune response, which ultimately could yield strong and durable protection against disease”. Zika can cause catastrophic birth defects, including microcephaly, a condition in which babies are born with abnormally small heads and, in most cases, incomplete brain development.
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The health department said it still believes local transmission is only occurring in the one-square-mile (2.6-square-km) area located in the Wynwood neighborhood of Miami.
The individual who contracted the virus had traveled to another country according to SCDH.
The CDC recommends pregnant women avoid traveling to Zika-affected areas, such as Mexico, the Caribbean, Central American, and South America.
“A lot of times, we make the mistake of viewing these kinds of viruses as being things manifesting overseas and only affecting people in the Caribbean or Africa”. The reason: better insect control as well as window screens and air conditioning that should help curtail any outbreaks. The U.S. surgeon general is urging Puerto Rico on Thursday, Aug. 11, to step up its public education campaign against Zika as he warned that 25 percent of the island will be infected with the mosquito-borne virus by year’s end.
The third patient has recovered from the infection, according to Galveston County officials.
The declaration will give Puerto Rico more money to fight the outbreak.
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“We haven’t seen any of the mosquitoes that the county’s mosquito control division traps routinely come back with Zika transmission”, he said.
