Also last week, health officials reported that areas of Zika outbreak will likely see an accompanying increase in cases of Guillain-Barre syndrome, which causes temporary paralysis, and has been linked to the virus. Among the open questions that remain is whether the virus causes neurodevelopmental changes that lead to blindness and other serious eye diseases in children born infected with Zika.
Advertisement
The Zika virus was discovered in the Zika forest in Uganda nearly 70 years ago and while it has appeared in parts of Africa and Asia in the past, it started spreading to other areas when it appeared in Brazil last year. On Saturday, it confirmed the first case of a locally transmitted Zika infection.
Dr. Van Philip Baton, Medical Officer of Department of Health (DOH-7) said during the Association of Government Information Officers (AGIO) – Philippine Information Agency (PIA) 7, said that as of now, there is no record of suspected cases with zika virus here in the region. He further comments that infected people should be checked for the presence of the virus in their eyes and for how long the infection actually persists. For the study, researchers infected adult mice with the Zika virus via the skin, which is similar to how humans would be infected through a mosquito bite, and discovered that the virus was active in the eyes seven days later.
Both dengue and Zika are spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which is common across Southeast Asia.
Eye infection raises the possibility that people could acquire Zika infection through contact with tears from infected people. After observing the effects of the Zika virus on the eyes of mouse adults, newborns and fetuses, they want to take the next step in their work with humans.
“Even though we didn’t find live virus in mouse tears, that doesn’t mean that it couldn’t be infectious in humans”, added Jonathan J. Miner, doctoral student at the Washington University.
Sexual transmission had initially been thought to be relatively rare.
Although the main risk of catching the disease is through the bite of infected mosquitoes, the World Health Organization said recent evidence had also indicated that Zika virus may be transmitted through semen and other body fluids, such as vaginal fluids and cervical mucus.
“That one case illustrates the real conundrum”, said Rajendra Apte, an ophthalmology professor and retina specialist who is one of the study’s senior authors.
Advertisement
But Aude Vazart, a French engineer who gave birth in Singapore last week, told Reuters leaving the island to avoid Zika was “too extreme”. “If you use the eye as a model to study drug delivery or drug efficacy, you could then use the knowledge you gain to treat viral infection in other places”. Zika virus is among the viruses spead by the species. Cell Reports. Sept. 6, 2016.
