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posted by martyb on Monday January 25 2016, @09:52PM   Printer-friendly
from the OB/GYN-layoffs-loom dept.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently issued a travel alert for 14 nations affected by the mosquito-borne Zika virus. One of those nations, El Salvador, is recommending against pregnancy due to a risk of birth defects suspected to be caused by the virus:

The entire region has erupted with concern over the virus, and each country has taken measures to combat its spread. Other Latin American countries, such as Colombia and Ecuador, as well as Jamaica in the Caribbean, have recommended delaying pregnancies, though not for an entire two years.

The rest of Latin America has responded with different tactics, ranging from widespread fumigation efforts to directing citizens not to be bitten by the Aedes mosquito, which is known to carry yellow, chikungunya and dengue fevers.

So far, the hardest hit nation in the region has been Brazil, where more than a million cases have been confirmed, including nearly 4,000 cases of microcephaly in newborns that could be linked to Zika. Microcephaly is a rare, incurable condition in which an infant's head is abnormally small.

Brazil has announced its plans to control the Zika virus while continuing to host the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro:

Inspections of Olympic facilities will begin four months before the Games to get rid of mosquito breeding grounds. Daily sweeps will also take place during the Games. But fumigation would only be an option on a case-by-case basis because of concerns for the health of the athletes and visitors.

The Brazilian health ministry says it is also banking on the fact that the Games are taking place in the cooler, drier month of August when mosquitoes are far less evident and there are considerably fewer cases of mosquito-borne viruses.

The World Health Organization warns that Zika is likely to spread across all of the Americas.

Related: Genetically-Modified Mosquito Company Expands Operations


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  • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 26 2016, @05:37AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 26 2016, @05:37AM (#294801)

    ... and hopefully wreck eco-systems. You fucking americans have those god damned genetically engineered mosquitoes which you are now trying to off-load on the third world so you are creating scares like this one.

    This is the same as that bloody unneeded ebola "vaccine" that you greedy mother fuckers tried to paw off on us for a fucking disease that happens every couple of years and always plays itself out and that takes far fewer lives every year than say automobiles or, I don't know, anthropogenic climate change, or one of a hundred other ecological disasters engineered and inflicted on the rest of the world by your self serving businesses.

    Ecological disasters like the one you dumb fuckwits are probably trying to engineer right now with your fucking genetically modified mosquitoes.

    First you make the sitcom friends, then you promote fracking world wide and now this!

    Makes me want to join jihad. Why can't you mother fuckers worry about your own, very messy, house and leave the rest of the world the fuck alone. I'm not some dirt poor fucking sand eater either , I'm a privileged middle class mother fucker and even to me, it is obvious you clowns need to be stopped.

    Such a pity ISIL, daesh, whatever isn't a real movement, but only a manufactured media fantasy designed to make muslims and freedom fighters seem... well a lot more like the bogeys in your imaginations, ironically more like you than them, else I would know where to fucking sign up.

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  • (Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 26 2016, @12:32PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 26 2016, @12:32PM (#294873)

    -1 flamebait? why because the truth hurts? bunch of shills.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 26 2016, @11:53PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 26 2016, @11:53PM (#295072)

    Can't find jihad buddies, huh? Be an army of one. :-)