Tag Archives: CDC

Flu Spreading Rapidly across the Country, CDC reports increase since Christmas

Weekly report of widespread flu cases throughout the US from the CDC

By Kami Klein

Flu season is upon us and this year according to the CDC, reports do not look good. In states like California, pharmacies are running out of flu medicine, emergency rooms are packed with patients, and the death toll is three times higher now than this time last year.  So far, in that state alone 27 people under the age of 65 have died since October.  And the cases have now spread across the country.   

The flu outbreak covers the entire United States with many hospitals filling to capacity.  Although it has not been called an epidemic yet, this year’s flu season has already spread faster and further than it did last year at this time. The CDC has also reported that during the week of Christmas the flu virus has increased sharply across the nation.  

The Los Angeles Times reported that UCLA Medical Center in Santa Monica are seeing over 200 patients a day in emergency rooms.  Dr. Wally Ghurabi, the ER medical director remarked on what they are seeing daily, “The Northridge earthquake was the last time we saw over 200 patients.”  

Methodist Dallas Medical Center’s emergency room is so overrun with flu cases that it is asking people with non-emergency symptoms to go to urgent care centers or see a primary care physician. And many hospitals have gone into diversion mode having to send ambulances to other hospitals and not accepting flu patients.  

The most prevalent strain of flu that is being reported by public health laboratories is influenza A(H3).  Symptoms come on suddenly and can begin with any of these symptoms; Body Aches, Fever, Headache, Sore Throat, Cough, Exhaustion, Cold like symptoms of Congestion and more frequently in children can include Vomiting and Diarrhea.

According to the CDC, most healthy adults may be able to infect other people beginning 1 day before symptoms develop and up to 5 to 7 days after becoming sick. Symptoms start 1 to 4 days after the virus enters the body. That means that you may be able to pass on the flu to someone else before you know you are sick, as well as while you are sick. Some people can be infected with the flu virus but have no symptoms. During this time, those persons may still spread the virus.

It is vital to note that people with the flu can spread it to others from up to about 6 feet away when those infected cough, sneeze or talk and the droplets land in the mouths or noses of people nearby or are inhaled into the lungs. A person might also get flu by touching a surface or object that has flu virus on it and then touching their own mouth or nose.

If you have been exposed to the flu, being aware of the risk of spreading is vital to slowing down this virus. Encourage family, friends and co-workers to frequent hand washing for at least 20 seconds with soap and water or use an alcohol based hand rub. Frequently touched surfaces such as telephones, computer keyboards, desks, doorknobs, light switches, should be cleaned and disinfected especially if someone ill has been around them.  

Anyone who is sick should stay home! By going to work or school you are only putting others who come into contact with you and their families at risk. Those who are the most vulnerable for this virus to become fatal are the very young, the elderly, and those that have other medical conditions. But there have been reports of healthy adults who are succumbing to this virus.  

Nobody is immune to the flu virus.  Health officials say that it is not too late for a flu shot even though at this time the current vaccine is only 10% effective in avoiding this strain of flu, but are also stating that while the flu shot may not protect you from the getting the flu it can absolutely help in your recovery if you are exposed to it.  

 

NOTE:  Morningside hopes you are taking good care of yourself. For many health items we use here at the ministry that can help you stay at your healthiest, please visit our store!

 

U.S. life expectancy fell in 2016 as opioid overdoses surged: CDC

A used container of the drug Narcan used against opioid overdoses lies on the ground in a park in the Kensington section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. October 26, 2017. REUTERS/Charles Mostoller

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Life expectancy in the United States dipped in 2016 as the number of deaths due to opioid drug overdoses surged and total drug overdose deaths rose 21 percent to 63,600, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Thursday.

Life expectancy fell to 78.6 years, a decrease of 0.1 year from 2015, the second annual decline in a row and the first two-year decline since a drop in 1962 and 1963.

Opioid-related overdose deaths have been on the rise since 1999, but surged from 2014 to 2016, with an average annual increase of 18 percent, to become a national epidemic. From 2006 to 2014 the rise was only 3 percent annually on average and between 1999 to 2006 averaged 10 percent per year.

In 2016, 42,249 people died from opioid-related overdoses, up 28 percent from 2015, while the number of deaths from synthetic opioids other than methadone, such as fentanyl and tramadol, more than doubled to 19,413, the CDC said.

The 2016 rate of overdose deaths was up across all age groups but was highest rate among people aged 25 to 54.

West Virginia, Ohio, New Hampshire, the District of Columbia and Pennsylvania had the highest age-adjusted drug overdose death rates in 2016.

The number of drug overdose deaths involving natural and semisynthetic opioids, which include drugs like oxycodone and hydrocodone, was 14,487 in 2016.

As the U.S. opioid addiction epidemic has worsened, many state attorneys general have sued makers of these drugs as they investigate whether manufacturers and distributors engaged in unlawful marketing behavior.

President Donald Trump in October declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency, which senior administration officials said would redirect federal resources and loosen regulations to combat abuse of the drugs. However, he stopped short of declaring a national emergency he had promised months before, which would have freed up more federal money.

(Reporting by Caroline Humer; editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Jonathan Oatis)

Plague in Madagascar Surprises and Alarms World Health organizations, U.S. not immune

World Health Organization responding to Seychelles plague

By Kami Klein

Experts are alarmed at a recent outbreak of plague that is spreading through major populated areas in Madagascar.  So far there has been 1,836 suspected or confirmed cases of pneumonic plague and 133 deaths in areas that have never seen this form of the disease before.

Every year Africa and Madagascar deal with an outbreak of plague within their borders. The World Health Organization (WHO) anticipates this in outlying areas and is ready to step in with antibiotics and information which eventually curtails the outbreak.  This year, health organizations around the world were surprised as the plague has spread so quickly and is primarily being found in heavily populated areas. While they anticipate around 400 cases a year, this year’s outbreak began sooner and a different strain of the disease has the world watching.

What is causing the alarm is that 65% of the plague occurring in Madagascar, pneumonic plague, is the only form that can be spread from human to human through droplets from coughing.  This makes containing the disease much more difficult and the chances that there will be more deaths almost certain.

According to the Center for Disease Control here in the United States, there are major differences in bubonic plague and pneumonic. Bubonic plague is spread to humans by the bites of infected fleas that live on small mammals such as rats.Without treatment, it kills up to two-thirds of those infected. One in 10 cases will develop into pneumonic plague which is almost always fatal if not treated quickly with antibiotics. This form, can and will spread from human to human which is the case in this outbreak. The good news is that a simple short course of antibiotics can cure the plague, providing it is given early.

Dr. Tim Jagatic told BBC News that the outbreak had spread to populated areas when a man infected with bubonic plague had traveled from the highlands to the capital and then on to the coastal city of Tamatave by bus.

“He had the bubonic form of the plague and entered into one of the major cities, where the bubonic version of the disease had the potential of turning into the pneumonic form without treatment.”

“He was in a closed environment with many people when he started to develop severe symptoms, and he started to transmit the pneumonic form of the disease to others.”

“So it wasn’t recognised until later,” he said, allowing the disease to “proliferate over a period of time unabated”.

This  case infected 31 other people, according to the WHO, four of whom died. It wasn’t until a couple of weeks later that an outbreak of the plague was detected and officially confirmed.

Although a travel ban has not been issued as of yet, officials do expect another spike in the disease before the season ends in April.  Medical personnel are all on  alert in parts of Africa that are most frequented by Madagascar citizens. WHO has delivered nearly 1.2 million doses of antibiotics and released $1.5 million dollars in emergency funds to fight the plague in Madagascar.

Though not widely publicized, the United States does have several cases of plague per year mostly in the Southwest. Dr Tim Jagatic, a doctor with Doctors without Borders currently working in Madagascar stated that the conditions which cause the plague outbreaks on the African island are also found in the US.

“Something today that very few people are aware of is that in the United States for instance, in the south-west, there’s an average of 11 cases of bubonic plague per year.

“These outbreaks occur simply because this is a bacteria which is able to maintain a reservoir in wild animals and every once in awhile, when humans come into contact with fleas that have had contact with the wild animals, it is able to transmit to humans.”

Information Sheet on the Plague

Information Sheet on the Plague

 

Sources:   BBC, WHO,CDC, New York Post  CNN

Trump declares opioids a U.S. public health emergency

Trump declares opioids a U.S. public health emergency

By Yasmeen Abutaleb and Jeff Mason

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump declared the opioid crisis a public health emergency on Thursday, stopping short of a national emergency declaration he promised months ago that would have freed up more federal money.

Responding to a growing problem wreaking havoc in rural areas, Trump’s declaration will redirect federal resources and loosen regulations to combat opioid abuse, senior administration officials said on a conference call with reporters.

But it does not mean there will be more money to combat the crisis. Some critics, including Democratic lawmakers, said the declaration was meaningless without additional funding.

“This epidemic is a national health emergency,” Trump said at the White House. “Nobody has seen anything like what’s going on now. As Americans, we cannot allow this to continue.”

The announcement disappointed some advocates and experts in the addiction fight, who said it was inadequate to fight a scourge that played a role in more than 33,000 deaths in 2015, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The death rate has kept rising, estimates show.

Opioids, primarily prescription painkillers, heroin and fentanyl, are fueling the drug overdoses. More than 100 Americans die daily from related overdoses, according to the CDC.

A White House commission on the drug crisis had urged Trump to declare a national emergency. On Wednesday, the president told Fox Business Network he would do so.

Officials told reporters on the conference call that Federal Emergency Management Agency funds that would have been released under a national emergency are already exhausted from recent storms that struck Puerto Rico, Texas and Florida.

The administration would have to work with Congress to help provide additional funding to address drug abuse, they added.

Under Thursday’s declaration, treatment would be made more accessible for abusers of prescription painkillers, heroin and fentanyl, while ensuring fewer delays in staffing the Department of Health and Human Services to help states grapple with the crisis.

‘BAD ACTORS’

Trump said he would discuss stopping the flow of fentanyl, a drug 50 to 100 times more powerful than morphine, with Chinese President Xi Jinping during his visit to Asia next month.

In his remarks, Trump said the U.S. Postal Service and Department of Homeland Security were “strengthening the inspection of packages coming into our country to hold back the flood of cheap and deadly fentanyl, a synthetic opioid manufactured in China.”

He added he would consider bringing lawsuits against “bad actors” in the epidemic. Several states have sued opioid manufacturers for deceptive marketing. Congress is investigating the business practices of manufacturers.

The president also said the government should focus on teaching young people not to take drugs. “There is nothing desirable about drugs. They’re bad,” he said.

Thursday’s declaration also allows the Department of Labor to issue grants to help dislocated workers affected by the crisis. HIV/AIDS health funding would also be prioritized for those who need substance abuse treatment, officials said.

As a candidate, Trump promised to address the crisis, including by building a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border to stop the flow of illicit drugs, which he touched on in his speech.

Additional actions under the move would be announced in coming weeks by various agencies, officials said.

(Additional reporting by James Oliphant, Susan Heavey and Jason Lange; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh and Peter Cooney)

High cholesterol levels among U.S. adults declining: CDC report

By Bill Berkrot

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The prevalence of U.S. adults with high cholesterol declined significantly between 1999-2000 and 2015-2016, achieving a long-term public health goal, according to data released on Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics.

The latest survey found that overall 12.4 percent of adults aged 20 and over had high total cholesterol compared with 18.3 percent in 1999-2000. High total cholesterol was defined as above 240 mg/dl in the blood.

High cholesterol is a key risk factor for heart disease, which remains the No. 1 killer in the United States despite dramatic declines in overall numbers in recent decades.

To improve the health of the U.S. population, a program called Healthy People 2020 included a goal of reducing the proportion of adults with high total cholesterol to less than 13.5 percent. Both men and women aged 20 and over met that goal.

The surveys over two-year periods provide a snapshot of health of the U.S. population, Margaret Carroll, lead author of the latest report explained. “It’s good news that total cholesterol is going down.”

Each survey targets a sample of about 5,000 people from counties across the country.

While the report does not explain the positive trend, one answer seemed obvious to Dr. Steven Nissen, chief of cardiology at Cleveland Clinic who was not involved with the CDC report.

“The use of statins has skyrocketed,” said Nissen, referring to widely used cholesterol-lowering medicines such as Pfizer Inc’s Lipitor, AstraZeneca’s Crestor and their generic counterparts that also significantly reduce heart attacks. “My guess is the vast majority of this difference is due to the use of statins.”

Public health measures such as bans on trans-fat foods, as well as individual decisions to alter diet and exercise has also likely helped, Nissen said.

The CDC report also found the prevalence of Americans with levels of “good” HDL considered too low fell from 22.2 percent in 1999-2000 to 18.4 percent as of last year. Levels of HDL are recommended to be at 40 mg/dl or above.

However, raising HDL via medicines, such as niacin, has never shown a correlation with better health outcomes.

The NCHS plans to release data on levels of “bad” LDL cholesterol, the prime target of statins, and triglycerides – both components of total cholesterol – later, Carroll said.

In 2015-2016, men aged 40-59 had significantly higher rates of high total cholesterol (16.5 percent) than those aged 20-39 (9.1 percent) or those 60 and over (6.9 percent).

Among women, the 20-39 age range had far lower rates at 6.7 percent, while more than 17 percent had high total cholesterol in the other two age groups.

Race appeared to make no significant difference in high cholesterol rates among men, but Hispanic women had lower rates than non-Hispanic white women – 9 percent versus 14.8 percent – with non-Hispanic blacks and Asians in the middle at 10.3 percent each.

(Reporting by Bill Berkrot; Editing by Richard Chang)

Listeria risk prompts Meijer to recall produce in six U.S. states

Listeria risk prompts Meijer to recall produce in six U.S. states

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Retailer Meijer Inc said it was recalling packaged vegetables in six U.S. states because of possible contamination from Listeria monocytogenes bacteria, which can cause fatal food poisoning in young children, pregnant women and elderly or frail people.

Meijer, based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, said there were no illnesses reported as of Sunday.

The recall affects 35 products and includes vegetables such as broccoli, cauliflower and asparagus as well as party trays sold in Meijer-branded plastic or foam packaging in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky and Wisconsin between Sept. 27 and Oct. 20, the company said on Saturday.

In February, Meijer recalled its Meijer-branded Colby and Colby Jack cheese sold through its deli counters because of potential contamination with Listeria monocytogenes.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated that 1,600 people develop a serious form of infection known as listeriosis each year, and 260 die from the disease, making it the third most deadly form of food poisoning in the United States.

“The infection is most likely to sicken pregnant women and their newborns, adults aged 65 or older and people with weakened immune systems,” the CDC said on its website. Symptoms include fever and diarrhea and can start the same day of exposure or as much as 70 days later.

(Reporting by Alwyn Scott; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Peter Cooney)

Puerto Rico declares Zika outbreak over, CDC maintains travel warning

Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen at the Laboratory of Entomology and Ecology of the Dengue Branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in San Juan, Puerto Rico, March 6, 2016. REUTERS/Alvin Baez/File Photo

By Julie Steenhuysen

(Reuters) – Puerto Rico on Monday declared that the 2016 Zika epidemic is over, saying transmission of the virus that can cause birth defects when pregnant women are exposed has fallen significantly.

About 10 cases of the mosquito-borne disease have been reported in each four-week period since April 2017, down from more than 8,000 cases reported in a four-week period at the peak of the epidemic in August 2016, the Puerto Rico Health Department said in a statement.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, however, has not changed its travel advice, noting that pregnant women should not travel to Puerto Rico.

The CDC said its travel notice for Puerto Rico remains in place and that it expects the virus will continue to “circulate indefinitely” in most regions where it has been introduced.

The Department of Health and Human Services declaration of a public health emergency in Puerto Rico relating to pregnant women and children born to women with the virus remains in effect, the CDC said in an emailed statement on Tuesday.

On its website, the CDC cites public health reports saying that “mosquitoes in Puerto Rico are infected with Zika virus and are spreading it to people.”

CDC acting Director Dr. Anne Schuchat said in a statement that she is “pleased that the peak of the Zika outbreak in Puerto Rico has come to a close.” However, she said, “We cannot let our guard down.”

Schuchat said CDC will continue to focus on protecting pregnant women and work closely with the Puerto Rican health department to support Zika surveillance and prevention efforts on the island, which is a U.S. territory.

A major outbreak of Zika began in Brazil in 2015 and spread rapidly to dozens of countries. There is no treatment for Zika, but private companies and governments are working on a vaccine.

In addition to Puerto Rico, the CDC has warned of a risk of Zika infection for travelers going to Mexico, Cuba, most of the Caribbean and South America, as well as parts of Africa and Southeast Asia. http://bit.ly/2m50Lf7

Locally transmitted Zika cases have also been reported in Texas and Florida.

(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago; Editing by Lisa Shumaker and Jonathan Oatis)

U.S. hepatitis C cases soar on spike in heroin use

FILE PHOTO - A man injects himself with heroin using a needle obtained from the People's Harm Reduction Alliance, the nation's largest needle-exchange program, in Seattle, Washington April 30, 2015. REUTERS/David Ryder/File Photo

(Reuters) – U.S. health officials said new cases of hepatitis C rose nearly 300 percent from 2010 to 2015, despite the availability of cures for the liver disease, fueled by a spike in the use of heroin and other injection drugs, according to a report released on Thursday.

In 2015, the national reported rate of hepatitis C was 0.8 per 100,000 persons with nearly 34,000 new infections, according to the report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Access to clean syringes and a limit on Medicaid barriers to curative treatments for hepatitis C can reduce rates of death from the disease and transmission of the virus to others, the CDC said.

New treatments for hepatitis C with a cure rate of over 95 percent from Gilead Sciences <GILD.O>, AbbVie <ABBV.N> and other drugmakers have the ability to virtually wipe out the disease, which can lead to cirrhosis, cancer, the need for a liver transplant or death.

But the opioid addiction epidemic appears to be creating tens of thousands of new cases, with unclean needles the leading cause of infections. Some experts say that one reason heroin use has soared is because the illegal drug has become much cheaper than prescription opioid painkillers and due to new limits on dispensing of the addictive legal pain medicines.

The CDC conducted a state-by-state analysis of reported cases of the hepatitis C virus (HCV), as well as a review of laws related to access to clean needles for individuals who inject drugs, and levels of restriction on Medicaid access to treatments.

In 2015, it found HCV rates in 17 states exceeded the national average.

The analysis found only Massachusetts, New Mexico and Washington had both a comprehensive set of laws and a permissive Medicaid treatment policy that could help prevent the spread of HCV and provide treatment services for those who inject drugs.

Twenty-four states had policies that require some period of sobriety to receive HCV treatment through Medicaid, potentially limiting access to cures, compared with 16 states without such restrictions.

Among the best ways of preventing spread of the virus are public health laws that allow access to clean syringes for drug users, such as needle exchange programs, decriminalization of the possession of syringes, and allowing the retail sale of syringes without a prescription.

Eighteen states had no such programs, the report found, while Maine, Nevada and Utah had the most comprehensive laws related to prevention, including syringe exchange without limitations.

(Reporting by Bill Berkrot; Editing by Leslie Adler)

Exclusive: CDC considers lowering threshold level for lead exposure

CDC building

By Joshua Schneyer and M.B. Pell

NEW YORK (Reuters) – The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is considering lowering its threshold for elevated childhood blood lead levels by 30 percent, a shift that could help health practitioners identify more children afflicted by the heavy metal.

Since 2012, the CDC, which sets public health standards for exposure to lead, has used a blood lead threshold of 5 micrograms per deciliter for children under age 6. While no level of lead exposure is safe for children, those who test at or above that level warrant a public health response, the agency says.

Based on new data from a national health survey, the CDC may lower its reference level to 3.5 micrograms per deciliter in the coming months, according to six people briefed by the agency. The measure will come up for discussion at a CDC meeting January 17 in Atlanta.

But the step, which has been under consideration for months, could prove controversial. One concern: Lowering the threshold could drain sparse resources from the public health response to children who need the most help – those with far higher lead levels.

The CDC did not respond to a request for comment.

Exposure to lead – typically in peeling old paint, tainted water or contaminated soil – can cause cognitive impairment and other irreversible health impacts.

The CDC adjusts its threshold periodically as nationwide average levels drop. The threshold value is meant to identify children whose blood lead levels put them among the 2.5 percent of those with the heaviest exposure.

“Lead has no biological function in the body, and so the less there is of it in the body the better,” Bernard M Y Cheung, a University of Hong Kong professor who studies lead data, told Reuters. “The revision in the blood lead reference level is to push local governments to tighten the regulations on lead in the environment.”

The federal agency is talking with state health officials, laboratory operators, medical device makers and public housing authorities about how and when to implement a new threshold.

Since lead was banned in paint and phased out of gasoline nearly 40 years ago, average childhood blood lead levels have fallen more than 90 percent. The average is now around 1 microgram per deciliter.

Yet progress has been uneven, and lead poisoning remains an urgent problem in many U.S. communities.

A Reuters investigation published this month found nearly 3,000 areas with recently recorded lead poisoning rates of at least 10 percent, or double those in Flint, Michigan, during that city’s water crisis. More than 1,100 of these communities had a rate of elevated blood tests at least four times higher than in Flint.

In the worst-affected urban areas, up to 50 percent of children tested in recent years had elevated lead levels.

The CDC has estimated that as many as 500,000 U.S. children have lead levels at or above the current threshold. The agency encourages “case management” for these children, which is often carried out by state or local health departments and can involve educating families about lead safety, ordering more blood tests, home inspections or remediation.

Any change in the threshold level carries financial implications. The CDC budget for assisting states with lead safety programs this year was just $17 million, and many state or local health departments are understaffed to treat children who test high.

Another concern: Many lead testing devices or labs currently have trouble identifying blood lead levels in the 3 micrograms per deciliter range. Test results can have margins of error.

“You could get false positives and false negatives,” said Rad Cunningham, an epidemiologist with the Washington State Department of Health. “It’s just not very sensitive in that range.”

The CDC doesn’t hold regulatory power, leaving states to make their own decisions on how to proceed. Many have yet to adapt their lead poisoning prevention programs to the last reference change, implemented four years ago, when the level dropped from 10 to 5 micrograms per deciliter. Other states, including Virginia and Maine, made changes this year.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is close to adopting a rule requiring an environmental inspection – and lead cleanup if hazards are found – in any public housing units where a young child tests at or above the CDC threshold.

If the CDC urges public health action under a new threshold, HUD said it will follow through. “The only thing that will affect our policy is the CDC recommendation for environmental intervention,” said Dr. Warren Friedman, with HUD’s Office of Lead Hazard Control and Healthy Homes.

To set the reference value, the CDC relies upon data from the National Health and Nutrition Survey. The latest data suggests that a small child with a blood lead level of 3.5 micrograms per deciliter has higher exposure than 97.5 percent of others in the age group, 1 to 5 years.

But in lead-poisoning hotspots, a far greater portion of children have higher lead levels. Wisconsin data, for instance, shows that around 10 percent of children tested in Milwaukee’s most poisoned census tracts had levels double the current CDC standard.

Some worry a lower threshold could produce the opposite effect sought, by diverting money and attention away from children with the worst exposure.

“A lower reference level may actually do harm by masking reality – that significant levels of lead exposure are still a problem throughout the country,” said Amy Winslow, chief executive of Magellan Diagnostics, whose blood lead testing machines are used in thousands of U.S. clinics.

(Edited by Ronnie Greene)

Texas reports four more cases of Zika spread by local mosquitoes

A woman looks at a Center for Disease Control (CDC) health advisory sign about the dangers of the Zika virus as she lines up for a security screening at Miami International Airport in Miami, Florida,

(Reuters) – Texas health officials said they had identified four additional cases of Zika likely spread by local mosquitoes, two weeks after the first case was reported in the state.

The four patients live in very close proximity to the first case, the Texas Department of State Health Services and Cameron County Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement on Friday.

The first case involved a woman living in Cameron County near the Mexico border, who is not pregnant.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Florida Department of Health said earlier on Friday the Miami Beach area was no longer considered an active Zika transmission zone.

The CDC said there had been no new cases of local Zika virus transmission identified in South Miami Beach for more than 45 days, suggesting that the risk of infection was no longer greater than in the rest of Miami-Dade County.

“Florida no longer has any identified areas with active Zika transmission,” Governor Rick Scott said in a statement.

(Reporting by Subrat Patnaik and Akankshita Mukhopadhyay in Bengaluru; Editing by Ted Kerr and Shounak Dasgupta)