Florida Department of Health officials confirmed Friday that four people infected with the Zika virus in the Miami-area got it from mosquitoes in the United States.
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MIAMI (AP) – There’s no official warning to stay clear of Florida, but the crowds that usually wander among the bold street murals in Miami’s trendy Wynwood arts district may be thinner after reports that mosquitoes in the area have spread the Zika virus on the US mainland for the first time.
Zika hot spots are most common along the gulf and a moderate risk in southern states, that includes Little Rock and Fayetteville.
More than 1,650 Zika infections have been reported across the US.
For Zika to become a homegrown virus in the mainland United States, a mosquito would have to bite a Zika-infected person and then bite another person, passing on the virus.
In a news briefing this afternoon, CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden said that although there is no way to retrospectively confirm without a doubt that the virus was locally transmitted by mosquitoes, “all the evidence we’ve seen is that this is mosquito-borne”.
No mosquitoes in Florida have actually been found to be carrying Zika, despite the testing of 19,000 by the state lab.
Until now, every reported case of Zika in the US was travel related, including 21 in North Carolina, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In May, more than 200 doctors, professors, scientists and other health experts signed their names to a letter urging the World Health Organization to apply pressure to either postpone, cancel or move the Olympics because of the threat posed by transmitting Zika over the globe.
The mosquitoes have a short travel range, and Florida officials are describing the infections as a “small case cluster” that do not indicate widespread transmission, the Times reported.
The CDC and Florida officials said that for now, the area of concern is limited to a square mile (2.6 sq km) in the Wynwood neighbourhood of Miami, a gentrifying area with restaurants and art galleries just north of downtown. Currently, there is no vaccine, and the main defense is to avoid mosquito bites.
DOH officials are conducting door-to-door tests and collecting samples from people who live there to determine any additional people who could be infected. “We just happen to be at the forefront”, Florida Gov. Rick Scott said. He did not say whether the woman was pregnant.
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But Phillip Lopez, a 34-year-old Wynwood resident who works at an outdoor bar and exercises outside, said: “It’s a concern, but you got to do what you got to do”. “However, if cases were to continue in that area even after the mosquito-control activities have been undertaken, that would be a very different situation”. “Sometimes you don’t know where these people were infected”.
