Two popular Caribbean islands added to CDC’s Zika travel warning

Costa Rica’s first patient started showing symptoms, which include fever, skin rashes, conjunctivitis, muscle and joint pain, malaise and headaches, on January 22 before he returned to Costa Rica on January 23.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is warning pregnant women to reconsider traveling to the 24 known countries and territories where the Zika virus is being transmitted.

Since the Zika virus infection during pregnancy has been associated with fetal microcephaly – which can cause abnormally small heads and serious, sometimes deadly, developmental delays – obstetrical ultrasound examinations of the fetus should be periodically performed.

For the majority of people infected, the symptoms are mild and pass within a few days.

According to Castro, the Zika virus is one of the most infamous public health scares in the history of Brazil. There is no vaccine or treatment for Zika.

Brazilian authorities, with help from the World Health Organization and the CDC, are investigating the possible link between Zika and microcephaly.

In a statement released on Wednesday, the AOC said “any team members who are pregnant at the time of the Games need to consider the risks very carefully before deciding whether to proceed with travel to Brazil”.

“The mosquito has been here in Brazil for three decades, and we are badly losing the battle against the mosquito”, the ministers told reporters as a crisis group on Zika was meeting in the capital, Brasilia.

“You can also imagine the fear that’s happening among women of child-baring age and parents who are thinking of having children, as well as women who are already pregnant”. “If travel can not be postponed, then strict mosquito bite prevention measures should be followed to protect themselves against bites”, the agency said.

Local health officials said they are continuing “surveillance to identify any potentially infected travelers returning to the county”. Worries about the rapid spread of Zika through the hemisphere has prompted officials in El Salvador, Colombia and Brazil to suggest women stop getting pregnant until the crisis has passed. Paho says there are no reliable estimates of the number of cases in the region.

“In the United States we have winters and colder season which reduce not only the abundancy of the mosquitoes that transmits the disease, but the ability of that virus to propagate and spread from human to mosquito to human”, said Ko.