(Trinidad Guardian) Apart from the fact the Zika virus can be spread by an Aedes aegypti mosquito, scientists have discovered two cases of the virus in semen, including one case where it was sexually transmitted.
Health Minister Terrence Deyalsingh and Dr Christine Carrington, a professor of Molecular Genetics and Virology, spoke about the situation yesterday at a Carnival week symposium held by UWI’s Medical Sciences Division on A Call to Arms Against H1N1 and Zika Viruses.
“The theme is very apt,” said Deyalsingh added who on Friday declared Zika a public health emergency and launching measures against this.
Speaking on the Zika challenge for T&T, Carrington explained that the virus carries the name of the forest in Uganda where it was first transmitted by monkeys. It spread to Nigeria and other African states and arose in Malaysia in 1960.
It reached Micronesia in 2007, Tahiti in 2013, Easter Island 2015 and Brazil in 2015. There is no vaccine for Zika. Widespread concern has arisen due to claims among Brazil’s 1.5 million cases that Zika has caused 4,180 cases of microcephaly—abnormally small head and brain in newborns.
Carrington said Zika is also being associated with Guillain-Barre Syndrome, an auto immune condition involving nerve cells, causing muscle weakness and sometimes, paralysis.
“Some people recover, others have permanent damage, others die,” she said. Carrington said it was felt Zika reached Brazil during the last World Cup soccer tournament. She said the large gap between being discovered in 1947 in Africa and reaching other states subsequently, was due to travel increases and movement of people.
The disease has spread to 21 countries including six Caribbean states. Neighbouring Venezuela, Guyana, Barbados and Suriname have recorded Zika cases. Jamaica listed its first case—confirmed in a four year old—last weekend. She said two cases of Zika have now been detected in sperm with evidence of sexual transmission in one. She said it wasn’t a common form of transmission since it is usually human to human
Carrington said Zika may already be in T&T undetected since it has mild symptoms and people may not go to hospital for it. Deyalsingh, said T&T has a critical situation on its hands with Zika.
“It’s what you don’t know about Zika that scares you,” he said.
“No one can say there’s no link between Zika and microcephaly. Can anyone says Zika isn’t sexually transmitted? They found one case of it in sperm. No one can say it isn’t sexually transmitted…so you’re fighting an enemy you can’t see as you don’t know the long term effect of it and its strength or virulence.”
The minister said T&T has no baseline information on microcephaly—only a small number has been reported in T&T—and until any link between Zika and microcephaly is disproven, he intends to protect T&T’s 1.3 million people.
“I don’t want T&T to end up with generations of small skulls and small brains that challenge appearances for life. You want that for your children and grandchildren?” Deyalsingh asked.
He said spraying of areas to eradicate mosquitoes is being done in communities where the Aedes aegypti is endemic. He said this didn’t mean every area in T&T since when he met municipal corporations last Friday some said they never had dengue cases, such as Rio Claro/Mayaro for instance, so there was no need to spray.
So far, 55,000 homes have been sprayed, he added.
Deyalsingh said he is a little disturbed that global agencies are responding slowly as they had with Ebola. He said it seemed “rich Western countries” only acted when it affected them and didn’t take notice when “little black” communities affected.
He said business people had suggested using genetically modified mosquitoes to destroy the Aedes aegypti but said the risks of introducing such species was unknown and it would require 2.8 million such mosquitoes to destroy 20,000 female Aedes aegypti.
