Florida health officials said that four patients in Florida infected with the Zika virus were infected in the Wynwood area.
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When individuals are infected with Zika virus, their immune systems produce neutralising antibodies to fight the infection. Congress left for its seven-week summer break directly before peak mosquito season without passing a spending bill to fund a federal response to the Zika virus.
Health officials are saying that now there is an epidemic of Zika in Mexico, the Caribbean Islands and Central and South America.
The state activated a Zika information hotline for residents and visitors, and health officials have led public campaigns reminding people to wear repellent.
Four locally transmitted cases of the Zika virus have been discovered north of Miami, sparking concerns for people who are traveling to Florida and igniting worry that it could spread further in the us mainland.
Florida’s governor says the state has concluded that four mysterious Zika infections likely came from mosquitoes in the Miami area. “All four of these people live in Miami-Dade and Broward Counties and the Florida Department of Health believes that active transmissions of this virus could be occurring in one small area in Miami”.
While the cases were not confirmed, as no insect trapped for testing has yet been proved to be carrying the disease, a statement from the Florida department of health said: “The department believes these [four] cases were likely transmitted through infected mosquitoes in this area”.
Pregnant women are considered to be at the greatest risk from the Zika virus because it can cause microcephaly and other birth defects. But the mosquitoes that carry the virus – called the yellow fever mosquito – are “not established” in Canada, and wouldn’t be suited to our climate, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada.
“We have been working with state and local governments to prepare for the likelihood of local mosquito-borne Zika virus transmission in the continental United States and Hawaii”, said Lyle Petersen, M.D., M.P.H., incident manager for CDC’s Zika virus response.
To get rid of these harmful mosquitoes, one must remove old tires from their yards, eliminate any standing water around their houses, said by the Florida Commissioner of Agriculture and Consumer Services Adam H. Putnam.
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It’s not surprising that no mosquitoes have tested positive because it can take a couple of weeks before an infected person shows symptoms, and by then the mosquitoes that transmitted the virus are dead, said C. Roxanne Connelly, a medical entomology specialist at the University of Florida and a past president of the American Mosquito Control Association. “This means Florida has become the first state in our nation to have local transmission”.
