Tag Archives: Zika Virus

Thailand confirms first Zika-linked microcephaly in Southeast Asia

City worker fumigates area to get rid of mosquitoes carrying Zika

By Aukkarapon Niyomyat

BANGKOK (Reuters) – Thailand reported on Friday the first confirmed cases in Southeast Asia of microcephaly linked to mosquito-borne Zika, as the World Health Organization urged action against the virus across the region.

The confirmation of two case of microcephaly, a birth defect marked by small head size, came a day after U.S. health officials recommended that pregnant women postpone non-essential travel to 11 Southeast Asian countries because of the risk of Zika.

“We have found two cases of small heads linked to Zika, the first cases in Thailand,” Prasert Thongcharoen, an adviser to the Department of Disease Control, told reporters in Bangkok.

He declined to say where in Thailand the cases were found but officials have said they were not in Bangkok.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said the cases were the first of Zika-linked microcephaly in Southeast Asia and the virus infection represented a serious threat to pregnant women and their unborn children.

“Countries across the region must continue to strengthen measures aimed at preventing, detecting and responding to Zika virus transmission,” Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, the WHO’s regional director, said in a statement.

U.S. health officials have concluded that Zika infections in pregnant women can cause microcephaly, which can lead to severe developmental problems in babies.

VIRUS SPREADING

The connection between Zika and microcephaly first came to light last year in Brazil, which has confirmed more than 1,800 cases of microcephaly that it considers to be related to Zika infections in the mothers.

Zika has spread extensively in Latin American and the Caribbean over the past year or so, and more recently it has been cropping up in Southeast Asia.

Thailand has confirmed 349 Zika cases since January, including 33 pregnant women, and Singapore has recorded 393 Zika cases, including 16 pregnant women.

Some health experts have accused Thai officials of playing down the risk of Zika to protect its thriving tourist industry, but Prasert dismissed that.

“Thailand is not hiding anything and is ready to disclose everything,” he said, adding that other countries in Southeast Asia might also have cases of Zika-linked microcephaly that they have not disclosed.

The WHO said Thailand’s response was an example for the region.

“Thailand’s diligence underscores the commitment of health authorities to the health and wellbeing of the Thai public, and provides a positive example to be emulated,” Singh said.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Thursday people should consider postponing travel to Brunei, Myanmar, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Maldives, Philippines, Thailand, Timor-Leste (East Timor), and Vietnam.

The CDC has already issued a “travel notice” for Singapore, and said such a warning would be considered for the new countries if the number of cases rose to the level of an outbreak.

Thailand’s confirmation of Zika-linked microcephaly comes ahead of China’s week-long “Golden Week” holiday with Thailand expecting 220,000 Chinese visitors, up from 168,000 for the week in 2015, Tourism Authority of Thailand governor Yuthasak Supasorn told Reuters.

NO VACCINE

There is no vaccine or treatment for Zika. An estimated 80 percent of people infected have no symptoms, making it difficult for pregnant women to know whether they have been infected.

There are also no specific tests to determine if a baby will be born with microcephaly, but ultrasound scans in the third trimester of pregnancy can identify the problem, according to the WHO.

Zika is commonly transmitted through mosquitoes but can also be transmitted sexually.

Another Thai health ministry adviser urged everyone to work to stop the spread of mosquitoes but said people should not panic.

“Don’t have sex with a Zika-infected person. If you don’t know if they are infected, then use a condom,” the adviser, Pornthep Siriwanarangsan, told reporters. “We can’t stop women from becoming pregnant … but we mustn’t panic.”

Health authorities in the region said they were stepping up monitoring, but there has been little testing and officials said the real number of cases was bound to be higher than the confirmed figure.

“We do not test everybody, we test only those who are symptomatic,” said Paulyn Jean Rosell-Ubia, health secretary in the Philippines, which has reported 12 Zika cases.

“Yes, we are positive that the number is higher because we are not testing everyone.”

Malaysia, which has reported six cases of Zika, including two in pregnant women, said it would seek information from Thailand on the particular strain of the Zika virus there.

“We are taking serious notice of the reports in Thailand, and we will reach out to the Thai authorities for more information … so that we can be more prepared,” Malaysia’s health minister, Subramaniam Sathasivam, told Reuters.

Authorities in Vietnam, which has reported three cases of Zika, ordered stepped up monitoring of pregnant women.

In Indonesia’s capital, Jakarta, head of disease outbreak and surveillance Dwi Oktavia said there had been no sign of any increase in birth defects there. Indonesia had one Zika case in 2015 but has confirmed none since then.

Microcephaly in babies can lead to respiratory problems related to malformation of the brain, a serious threat to the lives of babies. Children with microcephaly face lifelong difficulties, including intellectual impairment.

Zika was first identified in Uganda in 1947 and first isolated in Asia in the 1960s. It was unknown in the Americas until 2014.

(Additional reporting by Amy Sawitta Lefevre, Juarawee Kittisilpa and Panarat Thepgumpanat, Kanupriya Kapoor in JAKARTA, Roxanna Latiff in KUALA LUMPUR, Karen Lima in MANILA and Pham Thi Huyen My in HANOI; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Alex Richardson)

Doctors say Haiti ripe for large Zika outbreak, virus under: reported

Residents in Haiti

By Makini Brice

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Posters warning of the dangers of Zika only reached Haiti’s health ministry in August, six months after the country reported an outbreak, in one example of delayed prevention efforts that have health experts worried a “large epidemic” is looming.

Gabriel Thimothe, a senior health ministry official, said the public service posters would be distributed to hospitals and airports shortly, but that health funding had been cut this year and foreign aid was sparse to fight the mosquito-borne virus that can cause severe birth defects.

Zika infections in pregnant women have been shown to cause microcephaly – a defect in which babies’ heads and brains are undersized – as well as other brain abnormalities.

Widespread fumigation that has limited the virus’ spread in other Caribbean nations such as Cuba only began in Haiti last month. Publicity campaigns have been all but invisible and hospital workers were on strike for much of the year.

“We’re expecting a large epidemic but we don’t know when it will occur,” said Jean-Luc Poncelet, the World Health Organization’s representative in Haiti. “There is under-reporting.”

Such an epidemic could severely strain Haiti’s fragile healthcare system, battered by an earthquake in 2010 that killed 300,000, and still struggling with a cholera epidemic that has sickened nearly 800,000 people.

WHO data show 5,000 suspected cases have been reported in more prosperous neighbor Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti and has a similar population and climate. Haiti by contrast, has reported 3,000 suspected cases, according to numbers shared by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That makes Haiti’s Zika infection rate about 30 per 100,000 people, compared to 82 per 100,000 in Brazil, where the connection between Zika and microcephaly was first detected, and 50 per 100,000 in Dominican Republic

The connection between Zika and microcephaly first came to light last fall in Brazil, which has since confirmed more than 1,800 cases of microcephaly.

RAINY SEASON

In the Dominican Republic there were spikes in infections in March and May, broadly coinciding with rainy seasons on both sides of the island, a time when mosquitoes and diseases they carry normally flourish. In Haiti, the number of cases reported each week generally dropped from February through the rains.

A long strike by medical residents at most public hospitals coincided with that decline, raising the question of whether there were fewer infections or a lack of health workers available to register cases.

A Zika task force, which includes the government and non-governmental organizations, was formed in May, Thimothe said. Several U.S. health officials in Haiti told Reuters that the United States provided $3 million in August to combat Zika in the country, money that was initially intended to be deployed against Ebola in West Africa.

Thimothe said the impact of an explosion of microcephaly cases would be devastating, but denied the condition was more widespread than thought, even though many Haitian women give birth at home rather than in clinics.

His position is supported by WHO data through June, which did not show an uptick in microcephaly or Guillain-Barre syndrome, a neurological disorder that can cause temporary paralysis and has also been linked to Zika.

But Louise Ivers, the senior health and policy advisor for Partners in Health, which along with Haitian organization Zanmi Lasante runs a hospital in the central town of Mirebalais, said she had seen at least 12 cases this year of Guillain-Barre, normally a rare condition.

The same hospital registered two microcephaly cases, including one confirmed to be linked to Zika, this summer.

“Maybe we are too late for prevention. Maybe we just have to manage the consequences,” Ivers said. “This could just be the tip of the iceberg.”

(Additional reporting by Joseph Guyler Delva; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel and Alistair Bell)

Singapore says Zika infections spread to nearly 190 cases

Nurses set up a mosquito tent over a hospital bed, as part of a precautionary protocol for patients who are infected by Zika, to show the media at Farrer Park

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Singapore said on Friday it had found 38 more people who had contracted Zika, raising to 189 the number infected with the mosquito-borne virus since authorities reported the first locally transmitted case six days ago.

Some of the new cases had been detected in areas where infections had not previously been reported, the health ministry said in a statement.

The ministry did not specify the locations, but the virus has been spreading daily beyond an initial cluster.

Singapore, a regional financial center and transit hub, is the only Asian country with active transmission of the virus.

On Thursday, it said the caseload had jumped to 151 infections, including two pregnant women.

Zika infections in pregnant women have been shown to cause microcephaly – a severe birth defect in which the head and brain are undersized – as well as other brain abnormalities.

The connection between Zika and microcephaly first came to light last year in Brazil, which has since confirmed more than 1,800 cases of microcephaly.

In adults, Zika infections have also been linked to a rare neurological syndrome known as Guillain-Barre, as well as other neurological disorders.

People shop for remaining stocks of insect repellent products at a pharmacy in Singapore

People shop for remaining stocks of insect repellent products at a pharmacy in Singapore September 2, 2016. REUTERS/Edgar Su

The United States, Australia and other countries have added Singapore to the growing list of places that pregnant women or those trying to conceive have been warned to avoid.

The first locally transmitted Zika infection in Singapore was reported on Saturday, with the initial tally including many foreigners believed to be among the hundreds of thousands of migrant workers in the island’s construction industry.

As the outbreak spreads, many of Singapore’s five million people are covering up and staying indoors to avoid mosquitoes as health experts warn that virus in the tropical city-state would be difficult to contain.

The Zika outbreak comes as Singapore prepares to host the floodlit Formula One Singapore Grand Prix motor-race on Sept. 18. Race promoters have said preparations were going according to plan.

There is no vaccine or treatment for Zika, which is a close cousin of dengue and chikungunya and causes mild fever, rash and red eyes.

An estimated 80 percent of people infected have no symptoms, making it difficult for pregnant women to know whether they have been infected.

The virus was first identified in Uganda in 1947 and was unknown in the Americas until 2014.

(Reporting by Saeed Azhar and Lee Chyen Yee; Writing by Miral Fahmy; Editing by Robert Birsel)

U.S. fights Zika mosquitoes with limited arsenal

Zika virus kit

By Julie Steenhuysen

(Reuters) – Over Wynwood, the Miami neighborhood where Zika gained a foothold in the continental United States, low flying planes have been spraying naled, a tightly controlled pesticide often used as a last resort. It appears to be working, killing at least 90 percent of the target mosquitoes.

Across the Biscayne Bay in Miami Beach, wind and high-rise buildings make aerial spraying challenging. So, the effort in the popular tourist destination has focused on ground-sprayed pyrethroids – pesticides that are safer but don’t always work.

The arrival in Florida of Zika, a virus that can cause a crippling birth defect known as microcephaly, has drawn into focus the limitations of the U.S. mosquito control arsenal.

Larvicides reduce future populations relatively safely. But for use against the mature mosquitoes that spread disease, only two classes of pesticides are approved. Each has drawbacks.

Organophosphates, such as naled, are effective. But there are strict controls to limit risk. Pyrethroids are safer but have been used so much that mosquitoes, in many places, are immune.

“That’s really the weak link in much of the United States,” said Michael Doyle, director of the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District. “We’re kind of caught off guard.”

DENGUE PREVIEW

Doyle led a 2009 effort against a dengue outbreak in South Florida, the first in the United States in nearly a century. Authorities threw everything they had at the Aedes aegypti, the same mosquito that carries Zika: backpack fogging, door-to-door yard inspections looking for watery breeding sites and larvicide spraying.

Still, 88 people were infected before the virus was brought under control more than two years later, and there continue to be sporadic cases in Florida.

The outbreak highlighted gaps in the mosquito control arsenal that remain, according to pesticide makers, abatement officials and entomologists. Few companies make pesticides for use in public health outbreaks, a niche market that is expensive to get into, has a limited upside and varies season to season.

Safety testing a new pesticide can cost up to $250 million and take 10 years, said Karen Larson, vice president of regulatory affairs at privately held Clarke Mosquito.

As long as a product remains on the market, companies must continue testing for unforeseen side effects, an expense that some makers have blamed for decisions to abandon products.

“There’s not a lot of profit,” Larson said.

Sales of the Dibrome brand of naled have been estimated at $12 million a year. By comparison, total crop pesticide sales for some companies can exceed $500 million in a single quarter.

Bayer, Dow Chemical, BASF and other agricultural pesticide makers “are not interested in going after a $20 million or $30 million a year market,” said William A. Kuser, investor relations director at Dibrome maker American Vanguard Corp.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has approved several new pesticides in recent years. But it has received few requests for using them against mosquitoes, said Jim Jones, Assistant Administrator for the agency’s Office of Chemical Safety and Pollution Prevention.

“Although it’s of critical importance, the amount one can sell is small and it’s variable, which makes it difficult for business planning,” Jones said. “You can go many years without having much of a market at all, then suddenly, whether it’s because of a nuisance outbreak of mosquitoes or something like West Nile or Zika, the market grows significantly.”

Abatement authorities have pressed for help with the cost of developing mosquito control pesticides. The 1996 U.S. Food Quality Protection Act includes a provision for subsidies to defray the expense of safety testing, but Congress has never funded it.

RISK AND RESISTANCE

At least 49 cases of locally transmitted Zika infections have been reported in Florida, most in Wynwood and Miami Beach. Most people have no symptoms or mild illness.

Because of the microcephaly link, efforts are focused on preventing infection among pregnant women.

In Wynwood, the campaign began with pyrethroids, synthetic versions of a chemical derived from chrysanthemums. Amid signs of resistance, authorities switched to naled.

Developed as nerve agents, organophosphates, at high doses, can cause nausea, convulsions and death. They can be toxic to wildlife, including bees. The EPA considers naled safe at permitted ultra-low concentrations, and it is sprayed annually over 16 million acres in the United States.

But it is banned in Europe, where the risk is seen as unacceptable. In the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico, where Zika is widespread, the governor prohibited naled amid protests over safety concerns.

Although naled killed more than 90 percent of mosquitoes in traps set in Wynwood, the Aedes aegypti’s resilience remains a concern.

“This is truly the cockroach of mosquitoes,” said Tom Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

DROPPING PESTICIDES

CDC entomologist Janet McAllister said pyrethroid resistance typically is limited by the mosquito’s small range. When resistance to one pyrethroid develops, another often works.

Still, she said, “we would love to see additional classes of insecticides available because, even in places that may have an effective tool today, that doesn’t mean it is going to last down the road.”

The EPA can fast-track its evaluation of new pesticides and expand the use of old ones. In response to Zika, it expedited new uses for pesticide-treated bed nets and mosquito traps.

Still, development of pesticides is painstaking. Even if the EPA speeds up its evaluation, required safety data can take years to collect. And the expense of ongoing safety testing has prompted companies to drop products.

Bayer CropScience, for example, told distributors it dropped the pyrethroid resmethrin in 2012, rather than do additional testing. Clarke Mosquito gave up temephos, a larvicide, six years ago, because of costs, Larson said.

That decision led to stockpiling in southwest Florida, said Wayne Gale, director of the Lee County Mosquito Control District.

“We purchased just about every bit,” he said.

(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen; Editing by Michele Gershberg and Lisa Girion)

Thirteen Indians among Zika infected people in Singapore

A man cycles past a construction site where locally transmitted Zika cases were first discovered in Singapore

By Raju Gopalakrishnan and Marius Zaharia

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Thirteen Indian citizens are among those infected in an outbreak of the Zika virus in Singapore, according to a person at the Indian High Commission in the city-state.    Foreign construction workers have been hit hardest in the first days of the mosquito-borne disease’s outbreak. Singapore announced the first locally contracted case of Zika late on Saturday.

Of the first 56 cases of Zika identified by late Monday, three dozen were foreign workers on a property development site where they worked and lived with more than 450 others.    Total Zika infections had increased to 82 by late Tuesday, but the Singapore government has not disclosed whether any of the more recent cases involved foreign workers. It did not respond to Reuters questions about the nationality of those infected.    The person at the Indian High Commission did not know if the Indian citizens affected were in the construction industry.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs said it had asked the Singapore government if any of its nationals were among those diagnosed with the Zika virus, but had yet to hear back.    Many of the 360,000 or so foreign workers in Singapore’s building industry are from the Indian sub-continent, including India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. While many are paid as little as S$2 an hour ($1.47), work 12-14 hour days and rarely take days off, they can still potentially earn significantly more in Singapore than at home.

“MOST SUSCEPTIBLE”

Some dormitory rooms where workers live can house more than a dozen people and have no working fans, increasing their potential exposure to mosquitoes as windows are often left open, rights groups and some foreign workers told Reuters.    Government regulations already require employers and dormitory operators to take efforts to avoid mosquito breeding habitats as part of a long-standing battle with dengue, another mosquito-borne virus, but rights groups say they are concerned that these rules are not always followed.    Heena Kanwar, executive director of the Humanitarian Organisation for Migration Economics, says foreign workers are “the most susceptible group” for infections “because of their living conditions.”

Reuters was unable to gain access to workers at the construction site which was the focal point of the initial Zika infections. A spokesperson for Woh Hup, the main contractor at the site – which is under a “stop work” order – directed queries to the authorities “as the case is still under investigation.”

A spokeswoman for the site’s owner, Guocoland, said the company was unable to comment “beyond what has been released by the authorities.”

Only local media were invited to a site visit by Minister of State for Manpower Teo Ser Luck on Tuesday, reporting that those diagnosed with the Zika virus were still living on site, but were separated from other workers, in rooms with internet access and delivered meals.

Debbie Fordyce, member of the executive committee of the group Transient Workers Count Too, noted that Singapore doesn’t release a nationality breakdown of foreign workers in its construction industry, so it’s not surprising it has not disclosed where workers with the Zika virus are from.

“It could either be for the protection of the foreign workers, so that certain groups are not ostracized and identified as carriers of the virus, or to avoid drawing further attention to the poor living conditions,” she said.

Dormitory operators, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said government agencies carry out regular site inspections, and this week sprayed insecticide and looked for potential mosquito breeding habitats.

They say the government acts quickly if conditions are sub-standard, and operators are required to have at least one sick bay available or contingency plans for infectious diseases.

One dorm operator said it was hard to monitor the spread of infectious diseases, noting there were as many as 240 workers on just one level of his premises.

Manpower Minister Teo told local media on Tuesday that action would be taken against operators who don’t take preventive measures “because this is a very serious issue.”

It’s still not known where the other foreign workers with Zika are from.

The High Commission of Bangladesh and the Thai embassy said they did not have any workers among those who tested positive. A Sri Lankan foreign ministry official said it had not been informed of any infections, and the Chinese foreign ministry said in Beijing it had no information about any of its nationals in Singapore having Zika.

(Reporting by Marius Zaharia, Fathin Ungku, Nicole Nee, Imogen Braddick, Masayuki Kitano and Aradhana Aravindan in SINGAPORE, Douglas Busvine in NEW DELHI and Ryan Woo in Beijing; Editing by Martin Howell and Ian Geoghegan)

Study shows extent of brain damage from ZIKA infection

MRI images obtained in the case of an 18-year-old woman with confirmed Zika virus infection in Brazil

CHICAGO (Reuters) – A report released on Tuesday shows in graphic detail the kind of damage Zika infections can do to the developing brain – damage that goes well beyond the devastating birth defect known as microcephaly, in which the baby’s head is smaller than normal.

The current Zika outbreak was first detected last year in Brazil, where the virus has been linked to more than 1,800 cases of microcephaly, which can cause severe developmental problems.

Prior research has shown the Zika virus attacks neural progenitor cells – a type of stem cell that develops into different types of nerve or brain cells.

The latest research, published in the journal Radiology, draws from imaging and autopsy findings linked with confirmed Zika infections done on 17 infants and fetuses cared for at the Instituto de Pesquisa, in Campina Grande in the state of Paraiba in northeastern Brazil, where the infection has been especially severe.

The study also included reports on 28 fetuses or newborns with brain anomalies whose mothers were suspected of having Zika during pregnancy.

Nearly all babies in each group had ventriculomegaly, a condition in which the ventricles, or fluid-filled spaces in the brain, are enlarged.

While most of the fetuses had at least one exam showing abnormally small head circumference, suggesting they had microcephaly, three of the fetuses with ventriculomegaly had normal head circumference, but severe ventriculomegaly.

Nearly all of the fetuses or babies in the confirmed Zika group and nearly 80 percent of those in the presumed Zika group also had abnormalities of the corpus callosum – a large bundle of nerves that facilitates communication between the left and right hemispheres of the brain.

In all but one of the cases studied, the researchers found instances in which developing neurons did not travel to their proper destination in the brain.

In many cases, the babies’ skulls seemed to have collapsed on themselves, with overlapping tissues and abnormal skin folds suggestive of a brain that had stopped growing.

“From an imaging standpoint, the abnormalities in the brain are very severe when compared to other congenital infections,” said study co-author Dr. Deborah Levine of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and a radiology professor at Harvard Medical School.

As with other reports, the paper suggests that Zika does the most harm in the first trimester of pregnancy. The researchers plan to keep following the cases to see what impact prenatal Zika infections have on future brain development.

There is no vaccine or treatment for Zika, which is a close cousin of dengue and chikungunya and causes mild fever, rash and red eyes. An estimated 80 percent of people infected have no symptoms, making it difficult for pregnant women to know whether they have been infected.

Zika is carried by mosquitoes, which transmit the virus to humans. A small number of cases of sexual transmission have been reported in the United States and elsewhere.

(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen; Editing by Dan Grebler)

Haiti finds case of microcephaly linked to Zika virus

Public Health guy for Haiti

By Makini Brice

PORT-AU-PRINCE (Reuters) – Haiti has identified its first case of the birth defect microcephaly linked to the Zika virus, a senior health ministry official said on Tuesday.

Gabriel Thimothe, director general at the ministry of public health and population, said the case was confirmed on Saturday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Haiti has confirmed 14 cases of the birth defect since March, up from previous reports of two cases, Raymond Grand Pierre, the director of the Department of Health and Family in the Ministry of Health, said.

In the other 13 cases, authorities have not established a link to microcephaly although the number may indicate Zika is more widespread in Haiti than previously thought.

According to a chart provided by the Centers for Disease Control, Haiti has recorded nearly 3,000 Zika cases.

But the World Health Organization says the overwhelming majority of cases of the virus in the island nation are suspected and not confirmed.

Thimothe said the baby with Zika-linked microcephaly was born in the city of Mirebalais earlier this summer.

Boston-based Partners in Health and its sister organization, Haiti-based Zanmi Lasante, said in a statement on Aug. 9 that two babies had been born with microcephaly in their University Hospital Mirebalais.

U.S. health officials have concluded that Zika infections in pregnant women can cause microcephaly. The World Health Organization has said there is strong scientific consensus that Zika can also cause Guillain-Barre, a rare neurological syndrome that causes temporary paralysis.

The connection between Zika and microcephaly first came to light last fall in Brazil, which has now confirmed more than 1,600 cases of microcephaly that it considers to be related to Zika infections in the mothers.

Haiti’s healthcare system is still suffering from the fallout of the 2010 earthquake that killed about 300,000 people and a still-ongoing cholera epidemic that began shortly afterward, killing about 8,600 people and infecting 707,000.

Health facilities were also paralyzed this year by a months-long strike by medical residents over pay and working conditions, which Thimothe said had largely ended.

(Reporting by Makini Brice in Port-au-Prince; Editing by Sandra Maler and Cynthia Osterman)

U.S. government shifts $81 million to Zika vaccine research

Zika prevention kit for pregnant women

By Julie Steenhuysen and Toni Clarke

CHICAGO/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has shifted $81 million in funds from other projects to continue work on developing vaccines to fight Zika in the absence of any funding from U.S. lawmakers.

In a letter addressed to Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat and minority leader of the U.S. House of Representatives, HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell said she was allocating $34 million in funding to the National Institutes of Health and $47 million to the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) to work on Zika vaccines.

Burwell said the funding was intended to keep Zika vaccine research going despite the lack of funding from U.S. lawmakers, who left for summer recess before allocating any funding to Zika research and preparedness.

The mosquito-borne Zika virus has spread to more than 50 countries and territories since the outbreak began last year in Brazil. On Thursday, Governor Rick Scott said state health officials have identified three additional people in the affected area with locally transmitted Zika, bringing the total to 25.

The Obama administration in February requested $1.9 billion to fight Zika, but congressional lawmakers have been considering a much smaller sum. A bill providing $1.1 billion was blocked by Democrats after Republicans attached language to stop abortion-provider Planned Parenthood from using that government funding for healthcare services, mainly in U.S. territories like Puerto Rico.

The Republican legislation also would siphon off unused money under President Barack Obama’s signature 2010 healthcare law to combat Zika. In addition, Democrats balked at a Republican provision that they said would gut clean water protections.

The new bolus of funds from HHS comes on top of the $589 million in repurposed funds previously allocated for Ebola efforts. HHS has said these funds will run out at the end of August.

At a press briefing in Washington, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said he needs $33 million to prepare to move the first potential Zika vaccine to the second phase of human clinical trials. The first phase of that testing is expected to end in late November or December.

Fauci said the health secretary has the authority to transfer 1 percent of NIH’s $33 billion budget per year from one Institute to the other. He said the director of the NIH, Dr. Francis Collins, will decide which existing programs the funds will be drawn from.

“He will probably do it on a prorated basis across the Institutes,” he said.

Fauci said the budget transfer will not fill the longer-term NIH funding needs to fight the virus and to develop a second or third potential vaccine candidate. Drugs frequently fail to realize the promise they show in early trials.

“We still need about $196 million more,” he said.

Fauci said the health secretary’s action was essentially one of desperation given the failure of Congress to authorize additional funding.

Taking money from other research programs “is extremely damaging to the biomedical research enterprise,” he said. “We’re taking money away from cancer, diabetes, all those things.”

Dr. LaMar Hasbrouck, executive director of the National Association of County and City Health Officials, said at the briefing that local health authorities are similarly siphoning off money from other programs.

“We’re robbing Peter to pay Paul,” he said.

In her letter, Burwell said the $47 million in funding for BARDA will allow the agency to enter into contracts with key partners to develop vaccines. But, she said BARDA will need an estimated $342 million in additional funding to continue its work with outside partners in the development of vaccines, diagnostics and pathogen inactivation technology used to protect the U.S. blood supply.

(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago and Toni Clarke in Washington; editing by Grant McCool and Bernard Orr)

Cayman Islands report second locally transmitted ZIKA infection

Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are seen inside Oxitec laboratory in Campinas, Brazil,

GEORGE TOWN (Reuters) – Two people have contracted the Zika virus locally in the Cayman Islands, the health department said on Tuesday, bringing the total number infected by the virus in the Caribbean territory to eight.

A woman living in Cayman’s capital George Town first reported her symptoms in July, and a sample sent to the Caribbean Public Health Agency for testing came back positive, the department said in a statement.

She is not believed to have traveled to any countries in which Zika is present.

Late on Monday, the health department announced the first known case of Zika contracted on the islands, by a man who had also not traveled to affected countries. Six other people have contracted the virus overseas and returned home carrying the infection.

Health authorities say that when contracted by pregnant women, Zika can cause the birth defect microcephaly and other severe brain abnormalities in babies.

The ongoing Zika outbreak was first detected last year in Brazil, where it has been linked to more than 1,700 cases of the birth defect microcephaly. Since that time the virus has spread rapidly through the Americas.

In July, Florida confirmed that the mostly mosquito borne virus had been transmitted locally on the U.S. mainland for the first time.

(Reporting by Peter Polack in George Town; Editing by John Stonestreet and Tom Brown)

China’s ‘mosquito factory’ aims to wipe out Zika, other diseases

mosquitoes being released

GUANGZHOU, China (Reuters) – Every week, scientists in southern China release 3 million bacteria-infected mosquitoes on a 3 km (two-mile) long island in a bid to wipe out diseases such as dengue, yellow fever and Zika.

The scientists inject mosquito eggs with wolbachia bacteria in a laboratory, then release infected male mosquitoes on the island on the outskirts of the city of Guangzhou.

The bacteria, which occurs naturally in about 28 percent of wild mosquitoes, causes infected males to sterilize the females they mate with.

“The aim is trying to suppress the mosquito density below the threshold which can cause disease transmission,” said Zhiyong Xi, who is director of the Sun Yat-sen University Centre of Vector Control for Tropical Diseases and pioneered the idea.

“There are hot spots,” Xi said. “This technology can be used at the beginning to target the hot spots … it will dramatically reduce disease transmission.”

Mosquito-borne diseases are responsible for more than one million deaths worldwide every year and Zika has become a concern for athletes at this year’s Olympic Games, which open in Rio de Janeiro on Friday.

Some athletes, including the top four ranked male golfers, have declined to take part.

An outbreak of the Zika virus in Brazil last year has spread through the Americas and beyond, with China confirming its first case in February.

U.S. health officials have concluded that Zika infections in pregnant women can cause microcephaly, a birth defect marked by small head size that can lead to severe developmental problems in babies.

The World Health Organization has said there is strong scientific consensus that Zika can also cause Guillain-Barre, a rare neurological syndrome that causes temporary paralysis in adults.

Sun Yat-sen’s Xi said that several countries had expressed interest in his experiments, especially Brazil and Mexico.

In the laboratory, mosquito eggs are collected from breeding cages containing 5,000 females and 1,600 males and injected with the wolbachia bacteria. Xi’s facility has the capacity to breed up to five million mosquitoes a week.

While a female mosquito that acquires wolbachia by mating is sterile, one that is infected by injection will produce wolbachia-infected offspring. Dengue, yellow fever and Zika are also suppressed in wolbachia-injected females, making it harder for the diseases to be transmitted to humans.

Xi set up his 3,500 square meter (38,000 sq ft) “mosquito factory” in 2012 and releases the males into two residential areas on the outskirts of Guangzhou.

Xi said the mosquito population on the island has been reduced by more than 90 percent.

One villager on the island, 66 year-old Liang Jintian, who has lived there for six decades, said the study was so effective he didn’t have to sleep with a mosquito net any longer.

“We used to have a lot of mosquitoes in the past. Back then some people were worried that if mosquitoes were released here, we would get even more mosquitoes,” he said. “We have a lot less mosquitoes now compared to the past.”

(Reporting by Reuters TV; Writing by Clare Baldwin; Editing by Robert Birsel)