The Iowa Department of Public Health announced the state’s first lab-confirmed case of travel-associated Zika virus February 19. A news release says all three cases are believed to be travel-related and that All 32 reported cases of Zika virus in Florida were acquired outside of the state. Officials weren’t identifying the counties where the pregnant women were diagnosed.
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Katherine E. Fleming-Dutra, MD, from the CDC in Atlanta, and colleagues updated interim guidelines for US health care providers caring for infants with possible congenital Zika virus infection and for children with suspected infection.
Brazil is at the center of a Zika outbreak and the virus is strongly suspected of causing a spike in microcephaly, a congenital condition that causes abnormally small heads and hampers brain development.
The CDC said in a statement on Wednesday in Washington that several of the cases involved pregnant women.
Since early past year Zika has spread across Latin and South America primarily through mosquito bites.
In the United States, President Barack Obama requested the withdrawal of $1.9 billion from the unused Ebola emergency funding to combat the Zika outbreak. The new mom, who is only one of six known Mexican mothers-to-be to be infected with the virus during pregnancy, delivered her son in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Mexico. “There is no vaccine to prevent or medicine to treat Zika virus infection”. For men, the center recommends, if their partners are pregnant to either abstain or use a condom during the term of pregnancy, as opposed to using protection for just one month. The men, who are no longer sick, are now being tested for signs of the virus, too.
The CDC made the revelation as it published new guidance on sexual transmission of the virus. In 2008, a researcher studying the virus in Africa was infected and came home and gave it to his wife through sexual contact.
Authorities say the measure is entirely precautionary, as the species of mosquito that can potentially carry the virus – Aedes aegypti – live and breed in the area.
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Go to the ODH website at http://www.odh.ohio.gov/zika for more information about Zika virus and links to CDC resources including travel advisories for countries where Zika virus transmission is ongoing.
