Loren Robinson, deputy secretary for health promotion and disease prevention at the Pennsylvania Department of Health, said pregnant women should take caution when planning a vacation.
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Malaysia has issued a health alert to all public and private health facilities on the Zika virus following a World Health Organisation alarm that the virus is spreading explosively.
While there is no evidence the Zika virus can be passed human to human, there have been reports the virus has been isolated in human blood and semen.
All of the cases involved people returning to the USA from countries where the Zika virus is spreading, she said.
The Zika virus, which has been found in Africa, Southeast Asia, South America and the Pacific Islands, is spread to people through the bite of an infected mosquito.
Zika is now present in 23 countries and territories in the Americas, with Brazil hardest hit.
The Aedes aegypti mosquito that carries Zika also spreads the dengue virus, which infected 1.65 million people in Brazil a year ago, 863 of whom died, in the country’s worst outbreak of the tropical disease.
Officials say the patient in Boston is expected to survive – and even though Americans have been diagnosed with Zika, there’s no evidence that anyone got infected by a mosquito in the U.S. Symptoms can include a rash, pink eye, sore muscles and joints, and a fever. Severe disease requiring hospitalisation is uncommon and the case fatality rate is low. “CDC has been monitoring these epidemics and is prepared to address cases imported into the United States and cases transmitted locally”. For that reason, the CDC is recommending that women who are pregnant or may become pregnant not to travel to the 24 countries where the disease is widespread.
The commission said it will cooperate with the World Health Organization and closely follow the virus outbreak in other regions.
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Taylor stressed that while Zika has an association with microcephaly – a condition where a baby is born with an abnormally small head – it has not been proven yet.
