Several of the cases involve pregnant women, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned Tuesday. In each of the new cases, the travelers were men who reported symptoms of Zika two weeks before their non-traveling symptoms appeared in their female partners.
Advertisement
The virus has been linked in Brazil to an alarming surge in the birth of babies with abnormally small heads, a condition known as microcephaly, and other neurological disorders.
They also advise men concerned about the Zika virus to consider using condoms or abstaining from sex, even if their partners are not pregnant.
Melanie Amato, a public information officer for the Ohio Department of Health, said in an email that questions about the virus, which is transmitted through mosquito bites, can be answered with the ODH’s Zika web page, which states, “The primary mosquito that transmits Zika virus is Aedes aegypti, the yellow fever mosquito”. “For the time being we are telling women to avoid sex or to be careful during sex with a partner who is coming back from an area where Zika is”.
Maternity hospitals in Paraiba, the impoverished state that is one of the epicenters of Brazil’s tandem outbreaks of Zika and microcephaly, provided the CDC and its Brazilian partners with mothers’ addresses. The virus is infecting millions of people who have never had it before and it’s giving doctors a chance to use modern tests and techniques to see how new infections move across a population.
The agency said that there is no evidence that women can transmit Zika virus to their sex partners, but added that more research is needed.
“The CDC still feels that mosquito-borne transmission is the most common route for Zika”, says McQuiston. Meanwhile, a group of Brazilian activists, scientists and lawyers have asked their highest court to permit abortions for women who have contracted the virus.
“The Zika virus itself does not kill; the disease is self-limiting”. But in Brazil, health officials have reported an apparent link between Zika infection and a rare birth defect. But, the risk of blood transmission is considered likely based on the most current scientific evidence of how Zika and similar viruses are spread. “I hope that means they think that the study is important”, she said.
There is no vaccine or treatment for Zika, which has caused outbreaks in at least 26 countries in the Americas. The CDC on Tuesday expanded its Zika travel advisory to two more places – the Marshall Islands, and Trinidad and Tobago.
Advertisement
US health officials are investigating more than a dozen possible Zika infections that may have been spread through sex.
