World Health Organization officials said studies would continue to figure out why certain regions of Brazil have reported an increase in babies born with microcephaly, a developmental disorder that causes smaller-than-average heads.
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“This extraordinary event is rapidly becoming, unfortunately, an ordinary event”.
All air/ship passengers from Singapore and other Zika-affected countries who reach the State will have to be under 14-day surveillance from the day of departure even though they do not have any evident clinical symptoms or fever.
Of those infected in Singapore, eleven are Malaysians, the ministry said. “But in other countries where it might enter at some time, that might not be the case”.
It did not specify the locations, but said the virus has been spreading daily beyond an initial cluster.
The Health Ministry has confirmed that a male patient from Sabah, the first locally transmitted case of Zika virus infection in the country, died due to complications from his underlying heart condition.
Worldwide health authorities had said that the Olympics would not be a danger for furthering spread of the virus.
“Really, it will be after the first freeze of the year before we can breath a little easier”, Harrison said.
The virus was first identified in Uganda in 1947 and was unknown in the Americas until 2014. Singapore had 155 cases as of Wednesday.
“We don’t have a definitive answer”, said Dr. Peter Salama, WHO’s director of emergencies.
Despite Zika’s spread to more than 70 countries and territories, Brazil has the vast majority of cases of microcephaly, or infants born with abnormally small heads.
Many are believed to be overseas workers at building sites in Singapore, although the Singapore government has not given details of the victims by nationality.
According to the Health Center of Thailand, where more than 4,000 Japanese corporations are located, Zika infection was first reported in 2012, with five cases on average being discovered in each of the following years.
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Heymann said Singapore was expected to complete genetic sequencing of the virus by next week, which would show which strain was causing the outbreak there.
