The Aedes aegypti mosquito does not discriminate between rich and poor, but it reproduces in societies where poverty is endemic, where there is no reliable access to water and families use tanks and makeshift receptacles, where sanitation is inadequate or non-existent, and where rainwater and sewage run or accumulate in the open air. A century later, the same disease foiled France’s effort to build a canal across Panama.
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At Least 51 People Sickened by Zika Virus in the U.S.
Also causing concern is the possibility of transmission through sexual contact.
A Brazilian soldier conducts a street inspection in Recife.
The virus, spreading quickly across the Americas, is usually transmitted by mosquitoes.
In institutions such as the Fundação Oswaldo Cruz, cutting-edge, publicly-funded research into Zika and other neglected tropical diseases is underway.
There have now been 11 positive cases of Zika virus infection among New York State residents, including one in Orange County. Dir. of Rio 2016 Olympic Games.
There is much to learn from Brazil. Some were shared with the United States, including tissue samples from two newborns who died and two fetuses recently examined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Thus far, there is no vaccine for the virus.
The Pan American Health Organization, the WHO’s arm for the Americas, said it needed an estimated $8.5 million to help countries in the region respond to the Zika threat.
The Wednesday meeting of ministers from 14 countries focused on ways to reduce the population of virus-carrying mosquitoes. “Just like in a hurricane, what we always say to ourselves is we’re going to prepare for the worst and hope for the best and we’re going to do everything we can to stay ahead of the Zika Virus”, Governor Scott said at a Thursday afternoon news conference.
The Aedes aegypti is a very effective mosquito species for carrying viruses, as evidenced by the fact that it is the primary carrier of the yellow fever, dengue and chikungunya viruses. Symptoms normally consist of flu-like pains and fever. It may mean carrying repellant and covering skin – the opposite of what many people tend to do on tropical vacations. In Brazil, the most heavily affected country, for example, there is already a network of local clinics linked to community health workers who go from household to household to address health issues. It is active during the day unlike the anopheles mosquito (the malaria carrier), which is more nocturnal.
In addition, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has urged pregnant women to consider delaying travel to locations with ongoing Zika transmissions, added Jamaica and Tonga to its travel alert. Hence, bed-nets are ineffective. The world spent $2.7 billion treating and fighting malaria in 2013.
Pfizer Inc, Johnson and Johnson and Merck & Co Inc said they were evaluating their technologies or existing vaccines for their potential to combat Zika. “Nigeria can not handle it if it comes”.
“That’s insane”, said Michael Osterholm, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Minnesota.
In the meantime, Chan said, the world could not put off coordinating measures to protect against the spread of Zika, in the affected region and beyond.
Spraying pesticide fog in a residential neighborhood in São Paulo. Almost 4,000 cases have been recorded. After approvals from health authorities, production must be scaled. The plan is to deploy a vaccine and eliminate Anopheles.
The virus, which is related to dengue, was first detected in 1947 in monkeys in Uganda, and for decades, caused only mild diseases across a narrow equatorial belt of Africa and Asia.
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Experts still stress that mosquitoes are the main culprit in the Zika epidemic menacing Latin America and looming over the U.S. “If they don’t have symptoms, (they would) get serial ultrasounds”. We have to manage all of those things.
