Zika in Florida: travel warning for pregnant women

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American health authorities advise pregnant women to avoid staying in the Miami Beach area. Various cases of Zika virus infections have occurred here in the last few days. The explosive thing about the incident: unlike previous cases of illness in the USA, people were not infected while traveling or having sex with returnees, but directly in the region through mosquito bites.

So far, two areas have been affected: one in a northern area of ​​the city, but also an area in Miami Beach. The travel warning from the American health authority Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (C.D.C.) applies to the heart of tourism in the region. The five people who were infected here include a traveler from New York and Texas and a woman from Taiwan. A total of 36 people were infected locally in Florida, 25 of them in Miami.

Further outbreaks expected

C.D.C. Director Dr. Thomas R. Frieden warns that there will soon be more outbreaks in the country. When and where is uncertain, since the disease is often symptom-free: It is possible that Zika is already being actively transmitted in other neighboring counties without people knowing about it.

Health experts had long warned that Zika would spread to warmer regions of the United States, including Florida. Mosquitoes feel very comfortable in the warm, humid climate, including the carrier of the disease, the Egyptian tiger mosquito.

Danger to the brain

In 2015, the virus, which originally came from the African continent, first spread rapidly in Brazil and later across South America.

A Zika infection is mild in most cases, but can severely damage the brain development of the unborn. They then develop something called microcephaly, an abnormally small skull and brain malformations that can be associated with severe disabilities.

In addition, a recent study showed that the virus also causes changes in the brains of adults. This could be a possible explanation for the fact that infected people seem to develop Guillain-Barré syndrome more often. It is a rare neurological autoimmune disease that is associated with symptoms of paralysis and even fatal respiratory paralysis.

Source: New York Times, August 19, 2016

Hongda Li et al .: Zika Virus Infects Neural Progenitors in the Adult Mouse Brain and Age Proliferation; Cell Stem Cell, Available online August 18, 2016

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