There is no denying that Brazil has had a tough 2015 at least in the health front. Last year, the country saw a spike in citizens contracting a mosquito borne virus called Zika and at present it is estimated that between 500,000 to 1.5 million people have been affected.
While Zika itself is a nonfatal disease, its spread coincided with an increase in babies born with abnormally small head otherwise known as microcephaly. From 2010-2014, the country documented less than 200 babies born with microcephaly. However in the thick of the Zika pandemic last year, the statistics increased to a whopping 3,000 microcephalic births.
The correlation between Zika and microcephaly has not been proven. Despite this, Brazil has already settled into a state of panic with local doctors going so far as to advice women not to get pregnant.
Earlier in the month, there has also been concern that the virus might become endemic in the U.S. According to experts, the type of mosquito that carry Zika also carries dengue and chikungunya so it is not unlikely that Zika would soon follow the other mosquito borne diseases.
Alas, mere hours ago The Wall Street Journal has reported the first U.S. charted Zika patient following the Brazilian outbreak. A woman from Dallas who recently travelled to El Salvador has tested positive to the virus. She has subsequently recovered from the ailment and thus far doctors from the Harris Country Public Health & Environment Services department have explained that as far as is known the virus is not present in the mosquitoes present in the U.S.
Mustapha Debboun, Harris County's director of mosquito control was quick to relate that authorities have been doing what they can to prepare for an outbreak.
"We really have to be very proactive in trying to stop it. If it's spreading this fast in South America and Latin America, it might do that in the U.S" quipped Debboun.
