Government says three Canadians infected with Zika virus after travel

With a strong global health leader to coordinate a mosquito eradication campaign, pilot studies and the pursuit of a vaccine, it might be possible to make a major dent in the rapidly spreading Zika virus now decimating the Americas. The CDC is urging pregnant women to postpone traveling to areas where the Zika Virus transmission is happening.

“So if a patient comes in with fever, joint pain or rash, it is suspected to be Zika at this point, because we do know we have Zika here”, Ellis said.

Although the virus has not been associated with deaths in adults, it has been linked to severe birth defects in thousands of babies in Brazil.

The main concern is that the illness, which is transmitted through infected mosquitoes biting humans, has been linked to birth defects and neurological problems in babies.

Aedes mosquitoes that transmit the virus are found in all countries in the Americas except Canada and Chile, according to the Pan American Health Organization.

Cases of Zika have been reported in more than 20 countries in South and Central America and the Caribbean, as well as parts of Mexico, following its spread from Africa to Asia and the Pacific Islands.

Currently, complex tests can spot traces of the virus in antibodies but take up to 10 days, because the antibodies produced are similar to those of dengue, another disease spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito.

The Brazilian government blames the incidence of microcephaly on Zika, but the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization have not positively confirmed the link.

“Congress needs to put its money where its mouth is, and where the fears of the nation rightly are”, Blumenthal said.

While health officials say most people exposed to the virus suffer only mild symptoms, the risk is far greater for pregnant women. Those tests are being processed by the CDC in Atlanta, which has the only laboratory in the United States capable of detecting Zika.

Venezuelan Minister of Health Luisana Melo appeared on state television on Thursday and said Venezuelan authorities have recorded 4,700 suspected cases of Zika here. “The level of alarm is extremely high”, Chan told World Health Organization executive board members at a meeting in Geneva.

“We would view a decline in shares as a result of the Zika virus as a buying opportunity”. Santos says as many as 600,000 people could be infected when the virus reaches its peak.

Walter Tabachnick, former director of the Florida Medical Entomology Laboratory, pressed residents to help with the effort by cleaning up their properties and eliminating standing water, where mosquitoes breed. If successful, that may allow the vaccine to be used during a public health emergency in October or November.