Mosquitoes clearly remain the main way the Zika virus is transmitted, says Thomas Frieden, who heads the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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Planes landing at United Kingdom airports including nearby Luton from areas affected by Zika are to be sprayed with insecticide as part of the Government’s response to the outbreak.
WA Health chief health officer Tarun Weeramanthri said there was no risk to people who had not recently travelled to a Zika-affected country.
Along with Miami-Dade, which has five cases, Broward on Thursday joined the list of five Florida counties under a declaration of public health emergency issued by Gov. Rick Scott.
The Zika virus adds to other problems with South America’s first Olympics, including severe water pollution in Rio’s sailing and rowing venues, and deep cuts of nearly 30% to keep the operating budget in balance.
Dallas County Health officials say the patients whose Zika virus fever diagnoses were disclosed earlier this week have made full recoveries.
As many as four more suspected cases of Zika virus fever may be tied to North Texas.
“This is not a generalised public health measure, for the love of God”, he said.
Brazil’s ministry of health announced today that its investigation has reported 3,670 cases of microcephaly. Broward County’s Division of Highway and Bridge Maintenance, responsible for mosquito control, was flooded with 80 to 100 calls on Thursday, said division director Anh Ton.
He said that risk for developing Zika depends on how long a person was in the area where Zika is present, how many mosquitoes are active in that area, how many mosquito bites they had and how well they protected themselves.
Carvalho said that infection probably was caused by the transfusion but genetic tests have not yet been conducted to confirm it. He said it was very unlikely the infection was caused by a mosquito bite because the patient was in a hospital intensive care unit for three months.
Researcher and molecular engineering lecturer at the University of the Sunshine Coast Joanne MacDonald said while Zika had been the subject of research for years, the current link to microcephaly was a “quite scary”.
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In Brazil, Paulo Gadelha, president of the Fiocruz research institute, said that scientists have found live virus in saliva and urine samples, and the possibility it could be spread by the two body fluids requires further study.
