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Zika Virus Outbreak Prompts CDC To Expand Travel Advisory (washingtonpost.com)

Posted by timothy on from the medical-geek-central dept.

turkeydance writes: The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is asking pregnant women to avoid 22 countries that have seen outbreaks of the Zika virus. That's up eight from just yesterday. Disturbingly, the mosquito-borne virus, which may be causing abnormally small heads in newborns, has also been linked to yet another debilitating disease. The Zika virus has been spreading rapidly over the past several months, most prominently in Brazil. Its spread has been associated with a dramatic increase in microcephaly, a rare condition in which babies are born with abnormally small heads.

3 of 83 comments (clear)

  1. The thing I don't understand is why now? by Johnny+Loves+Linux · · Score: 5, Interesting

    1. The Zika virus has been Africa and Southeast Asia since forever.

    2. They don't seem to have microcephalic cases like Brazil has.

    3. The virus was introduced into Brazil sometime around 2015.

    4. 2015 Brazil sees a 10x increase in microcephalic cases.

    So far that seems compelling that Zika is causing the cases. But why aren't we seeing the same thing in Africa or Asia? It's not like the Zika virus in Brazil has had thousands of years to mutate into a version that causes microcephaly, but not the original strain in Africa and Southeast Asia. It's the same virus.

    It's not like the people in Brazil don't have the same "immunity" that people in Africa and Southeast Asian people have -- a large percentage of the Brazilian people *have* West African ancestors where the Zika virus has been found.

    Here's an alternate hypothesis: some kind of chemical has been introduced into Brazil in 2015 that's causing the birth defects. Maybe a pesticide that hasn't been properly tested, or a morning sickness drug that wasn't tested.

    Citations:

    For pesticides and birth defects: http://www.counterpunch.org/20... http://americanpregnancy.org/p... and http://www.beyondpesticides.or...

    Pesticides and microcephaly: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pm... and http://www.gmls.eu/beitraege/1...

    For morning sickness drugs: http://www.aboutkidshealth.ca/...

    1. Re:The thing I don't understand is why now? by Waffle+Iron · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Well, Influenza has a variety of strains, some of which cause illnesses that are little worse than a head cold, and others that can be almost as bad as Ebola. Maybe Zika also has variations.

  2. Re:"Yet another debilitating disease" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I'm from the affected area. North-east Argentina, near Paraguay. There have been hundreds of cases of Dengue Fever in the past week. All of this is happening because of the floodings, caused by excessive rainfall by El Niño. Temperatures have been extremely high too (37C at my city today).

    My fellow neighbor. There's reason to believe [Brazilian experts say] that the Zika virus was introduced in the Americas on the occasion of the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil. I'm on the same latitude as you are, suffering the same problems [except with unseasonably cool summer [which is nice]. Regards.