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Zika virus

WHO: Sexual transmission of Zika a 'concern'

John Bacon, and Liz Szabo
USA TODAY
An Aedes aegypti mosquito is photographed through a microscope at the Fiocruz institute in Recife, Pernambuco state, Brazil, Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2016. The mosquito is a vector for the proliferation of the Zika virus currently spreading throughout Latin America. New figures from Brazil's Health Ministry show that the Zika virus outbreak has not caused as many confirmed cases of a rare brain defect as first feared.

A sexually transmitted case of the threatening Zika virus in Texas is cause for concern and requires further investigation, the World Health Organization said Wednesday.

"This needs to be further investigated to understand the conditions under which, and how often or likely sexual transmission is," WHO social media chief Gregory Härtl said. "And we need to know if other routes of transmission are possible."

Dallas County Health and Human Services reported Tuesday that a patient contracted the virus from a sexual partner who was ill with Zika. The sexual partner became infected while traveling to Venezuela.

While the latest case highlights the rare occurrence of sexually transmitted Zika, mosquitoes are the overwhelming mean of transmission and must be the primary focus of the effort to curtail the virus, Härtl said.

"Health authorities need to take action to destroy the mosquito and its breeding sites, and individuals can take actions to protect themselves personally," he said.

Zika has spread to at least 25 countries and territories since first appearing in the Western Hemisphere last spring. On Monday, WHO declared the outbreak a "public health emergency of international concern."

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta has issued travel advisories involving more than two dozen countries stretching from Mexico, through the Caribbean and Central and South America. The Pacific Islands of Samoa and American Samoa also are included.

Zika is spread by the Aedes mosquito, which spreads a number of serious diseases, including yellow fever, West Nile virus, dengue fever and chikungunya.

Although doctors have known since 2008 that Zika can be spread through sex, "this is probably a minor or rare form of transmission," said Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.

Amesh Adalja, a senior associate at the Center for Health Security at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, agreed that communities need to focus on mosquito control. "People should not be distracted from the chief means of transmission: the mosquito," he said.

While practicing safe sex is a good idea, "it won't halt the outbreak," Adalja said.

Relatively few viruses are transmitted through sex, with well-known exceptions such as HIV, hepatitis C and HPV, the human papillomavirus, which causes cervical cancer, Hotez said.

Four out of five people with Zika show no symptoms. Those who become ill typically suffer fever, rash, headache, joint pain and pink eye, according to the WHO.

Zika infections are usually mild and deaths are rare. However, health officials are concerned about a link between the disease and a sharp increase in Brazil's cases of microcephaly, a birth defect in which babies are born with abnormally small heads. Children can experience motor and learning delays, and may never master simple tasks such as walking.

WHO declares birth defects linked to Zika virus a public health emergency

Two more Zika infections confirmed in Florida

Zika stays in the blood for about a week. It's not clear how long it might be retained in semen.

Although doctors had known Ebola could survive for a few weeks or months in semen, it was not until last year, during the massive outbreak in West Africa, that scientists documented the first actual case of sexual transmission of Ebola. Studies have found that Ebola can live in semen for at least nine months.

More than 30 Americans have been diagnosed with Zika, most of them travel-related cases, which pose a relatively low risk for spreading. The Florida Department of Health confirmed two cases of the Zika virus in Lee County on Tuesday, bringing the state's number of infections to nine.

The continental USA is not considered to have a Zika outbreak because the virus has not become entrenched in the mosquitoes that cause the illness.

Zika is spreading among mosquitoes and residents of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, as well as American Samoa.

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