Going back to 2013, there have only been six confirmed cases in California, and they were all in people who contracted the virus while traveling overseas.
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“That is why very recent advice is for pregnant women to avoid travel to those countries”.
Haq adds that “ultimately, we have to make sure that women have sufficient control over their lives and their own decision-making”. The practice is already routine on a number of flights from Latin America and other parts of the world as a precaution against malaria, which is also transmitted by mosquitoes. It’s more unusual for flights in the U.S.to do so.
There’s no treatment or vaccine for Zika virus. However, experts urged caution about the new finding and stressed that the virus is primarily spread by mosquitoes.
In a Friday statement to The AP, the health ministry said it was “at the disposal” of worldwide researchers studying Zika. An estimated four out of five infected people have no symptoms. “It will be weeks to months before we know more”.
He was also asked if tourists were getting anxious about traveling to Brazil.
Mr Hilton said the World Health Organization had not banned travel because of Zika, though pregnant women have been advised not to travel to Zika areas.
Zika virus disease is mainly spread by mosquitoes.
Common symptoms may include fever, rash muscle aches or due to the lack of accurate testing, there is now not a sufficient way to determine if one has been infected, but there are ways to prevent receiving the virus and spreading it, according to Spier. But it has become a concern because of a possible link with a birth defect in Brazil. Pregnant women experiencing symptoms should be immediately tested, and those not, are recommended to when they begin prenatal care.
“This is not a generalized public health measure, for the love of God”, he added, stressing both the seriousness of the discovery and reality that it was too soon to say how it could impact the epidemic.
Because Zika is carried by low-moisture dwelling mosquitos, local transmission is predicted to spread to all countries and territories where the Aedes aegypti mosquito is found, including the United States.
The Rio Olympics will not be cancelled because of the outbreak of the Zika virus in Brazil, with sports minister George Hilton saying the topic “is not in discussion”.
He said that while the CDC is working around the clock to produce these kits, “not everyone who wants a test will be able to get one at this time” and that some of the tests might produce a false positive.
The developments came on the heels of an Associated Press report earlier this week that revealed that global health officials were frustrated at Brazil’s refusal to share enough viral samples and other information to answer the most worrying question about the outbreak: Whether the disease is truly causing a spike in babies born with abnormally small heads?
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Mario Andrada, spokesperson for the Rio Olympic Organizing Committee, speaks next to a screen that reads in Portuguese: “Message about Zika” during a media briefing in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2016.
