CLEVELAND -- "Am I surprised it's here? No," says Frank Esper, MD, an infectious disease specialist at University Hospitals Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital after the World Health Organization (WHO) announced the Zika virus "is now spreading explosively" in the Americas, with 3 to 4 million infections expected over the next year by the virus transmitted by mosquitos.
"This mosquito likes warm weather," says Dr. Esper of the Zika-carrying arthropod. "It does not want to come up to the coldness of Ohio or Minnesota or Montana."
The mosquito carrying Zika virus thrives in warm, humid climates, like those found between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn which includes parts of the southern United States. But that doesn't mean the virus found mostly in Africa and Asia can't spread.
"What you have is a mosquito to human to mosquito transmission and as people are moving up and down, from here to Mexico, from Florida to the Caribbean," says Dr. Esper, "that's how we're thinking the virus can move into the United States."
Adults infected with the Zika virus experience flu-like symptoms -- fever, aches, red eyes -- but it's pregnant women who are most at risk.
"That virus can get into you and can get through your blood and into the baby and that's when we see severe infections in the newborn," says Dr. Esper. Doctors are examining a link between Zika virus and an increase in stillbirths and microcephaly (infants with small heads), which could bring about a variety of other development issues, like trouble learning, seizures, and deafness.
"We have no immunity for the virus." says Dr. Esper, who says researchers are trying to develop a very specific vaccine. "A vaccine to protect pregnant moms so we can make sure they have antibodies to protect the child when and if they become pregnant."
Sound bites from Frank Esper, MD, infectious disease specialist at University Hospitals Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital, and related b-roll are available for download at http://news.uhhospitals.org/.
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