Baby Born In Hawaii With Brain Damage Confirmed To Have Zika Infection

‘Pregnant women who do travel to one of these areas should talk to their doctor or other healthcare provider first and strictly follow steps to avoid mosquito bites during the trip’. The first travel-associated Zika virus disease case among US travelers was reported in 2007. But, after Zika’s mosquito hosts began setting up shop in new locales, the virus arrived in Brazil past year.

Enlarge / Countries that have past or current evidence of Zika virus transmission, as of January 2016.

The threat of Zika virus surfacing in the United States became even more pronounced when Hawaii health officials confirmed that a baby born with in Oahu had a brain infection linked to the virus.

The CDC stressed that additional studies are needed to further characterize the relationship and more studies are planned to learn more about the risks of Zika virus infection during pregnancy, but “until more is known, and out of an abundance of caution, CDC recommends special precautions for pregnant women and women trying to become pregnant”. For comparison, there were only 147 cases altogether in 2014.

The U.S. has warned pregnant women from travelling to a number of countries across Latin America and the Caribbean after new cases of the Zika virus were found.

But there are also viral infections that can cause it, such as rubella and chickenpox.

Health officials feared the jump may have something to do with pregnant women getting infected with Zika virus, which had also been spreading in Brazil. Brazil has been the hardest hit, documenting more than 3,500 cases of microcephaly between October 2015 and January 2016.

Zika causes a dengue-like illness, with symptoms that include fever, headache, skin rash, red eyes, and muscle ache, and it is usually mild and does not require hospitalization. But, it’s still does not definitively prove that Zika causes or contributes to the defects.

“That’s a pandemic in progress”, said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Meanwhile, health experts are scrambling to get out ahead of Zika’s spread.

The Aedes mosquito lives mostly in subtropical and tropical areas but can survive in other climates, too. “Many areas in the United States have mosquitoes that can become infected with and transmit Zika virus”, the CDC’s Hoffman told Ars.

“CDC continues to work with states to monitor for mosquito-borne diseases, including Zika”. However, recent chikungunya and dengue outbreaks in the United States suggest that Zika outbreaks in the US mainland may be relatively small and focal.