Three Canadians infected with Zika virus after travel

The World Health Organization (WHO) expects that the Zika virus will infect up to 4 million people, a senior WHO official said on Thursday.

With the World Health Organisation and the United Nations issuing worldwide alerts of Zika Virus spreading like wild fire, major airlines companies in the United States and the European countries have started refunding the tickets to its pregnant passengers flying to the South American continent.

Although WHO said that the Zika virus would not affect Canada or Chile, health officials in the Canadian capital said they had detected three cases in the country.

Symptoms include flu-like aches, joint pain, rashes, itching, and inflammation of the eyes, headaches but not everyone has symptoms, according to government guidance on the virus.

Most people who contract Zika won’t feel symptoms at all.

Efforts to combat Zika are focused on protecting people from being bitten and on eradicating mosquitoes, a tough task in many parts of Latin America, where people live in poverty and there are plentiful breeding grounds for the insect. “The level of alarm is extremely high”.

Brazil has been particularly hard hit by the Zika virus. “However, a large majority of people who contract the virus are asymptomatic, and in the case where a person feels symptoms, they are usually mild”. The risk is not so much to themselves, but to their baby, who can be born with the rare birth defect that causes the small brains.

Doctors at the NAIA said mosquito-carrying virus from Brazil could not reach airports and seaports in the country.

Additionally, there are no vaccines, specific treatments, and rapid diagnostic tests, available to combat the virus.

Here in Brazil, Zika virus has been linked to a surging number of babies born with abnormally small heads-a condition doctors call microcephaly.

“You can say that there really is essentially no risk at all [now] because we don’t have local Zika transmission in the United States”, said Dr. Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. During a special session on Thursday, WHO said it is convening an expert group on Monday to advise on whether the Zika outbreak -which has now spread to more than 20 countries in the Americas – qualifies as a global health emergency.

The blood samples were sent to the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control and then to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for testing.

While the Zika virus originated in Africa, Adewole says there are no current cases in his country. “FIGHT THE MOSQUITO” Zika had been viewed as a relatively mild illness until Brazilian health officials identified it as a matter of concern for pregnant women.

“We will see little mini-outbreaks like in Florida or in Texas that can be well-controlled with mosquito vector control”.

“A causal relationship between Zika virus infection and birth malformations and neurological syndromes has not yet been established, but is strongly suspected”, Chan said.