In Zika-stricken Miami, aerial pesticide spray adds to fears

Public health experts around the world are eager for more studies on the connection between Zika and birth defects, with many questions still unanswered not only about the effects on newborns, but about the future those children will face as they grow up.

Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs on Friday cited a recommendation by the Australian Department of Health to pregnant women to defer non-essential travel to the country.

Who should be careful of contracting the virus besides pregnant women?

“There probably are some people who have traveled who actually got Zika that never knew or thought it was a virus of some other kind”, Haft said.

“It makes you realize the bugs will fly anywhere they can, it’s kind of scary”, said resident Stephanie Efrid.

America’s top public health agency could lift its Zika virus travel advisory for the Wynwood neighborhood of Miami as early as Monday, officials said Thursday afternoon.

The research followed and compared pregnancies that resulted in healthy babies with those that resulted in cases of microcephaly – looking for signs that the Zika virus is passed onto fetuses who develop the defect.

Zika is the first mosquito-borne virus known to cause awful birth defects, a lot of them brain-related. “The more we study it the nastier the virus becomes”.

Zika, which was first identified in Uganda in 1947, is spreading across the world and has now reached 72 countries and territories, according to the United Nations.

The connection between Zika and microcephaly first came to light previous year in Brazil, which has since confirmed more than 1,800 cases of microcephaly.

Back in April, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention declared that maternal infection with the virus was, in fact, a cause of infant microcephaly.

There is no specific treatment for the virus and there is now no vaccine.

According to the HHS, there are three things that could trigger a spray by state’s Mosquito Control: detection of the Aedes Aegypti, the mosquito species that is the primary carrier of Zika Virus, detection of the Aedes Albopictus or Asian Tiger mosquito, which can be a possible carrier of Zika Virus or detection of the virus from a County resident.

The poll shows Americans lack confidence in the federal government to respond to a Zika outbreak, and there is significant bipartisan support for government to take further action to combat the virus. Of the babies who were scanned, 11 had some form of visible brain abnormality, which the authors say was a smaller percentage than other reports have found.

The scientists found that 41 percent of the babies born with microcephaly were infected with Zika.

Symptoms can include fever, rash, joint and muscle pain, and nausea, but most infected people may not realize they have the virus.

Avoiding mosquito bites is the best way against getting infected.

“Before leaving the country, spend some time to ensure that your house is clean and free from mosquito breeding sites especially if you and your family will be away from home for a while”.