Zika Virus? What's your take?

[ericcsong]

Originally Posted by AmericanEagle

What part of Honduras is this?
My wife is from that country,
and I visited when we got engaged.
We flew-into San Pedro Sula.
Her tiny town of Pimienta was 45 minutes from there.
While there, we also took a very long
bus ride to visit the Mayan ruins in Copan.

We fly into San Pedro Sula and then travel just north of Omoa toward Guatemala in a small town called Tegucigalpita. We absolutely love it there!

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[AmericanEagle]

Originally Posted by ericcsong

We fly into San Pedro Sula and then travel just north of Omoa toward Guatemala in a small town called Tegucigalpita. We absolutely love it there!

Nice!
I know that Tegucigalpa is the country's capital,
but I never heard of Tegucigalpita until now.
Knowing the Spanish language, that would mean
"little" or "tiny" Tegucigalpa.

[radiomanjh]

I truly don't know what to make of this. We have the Nile virus here in the states which can be deadly to unhealthy people and now the Zika virus and it can be transmitted sexually also and there both by mosquitoes. Maybe they really don't know the severity of it and just being cautious. All I know is that I'm 65 and got a flu shot only once in my life about twenty years ago and became sick a few days later and was bed ridden for a week.

[ericcsong]

Originally Posted by Explorer

Forgive me if I'm mistaken, but isn't the recent news sparked by a spike in cases of microcephaly and Guillain-Barré syndrome caused by the virus?

A spike implies, well, a spike, instead of a steady number of cases.

Here is an interesting stat I read from BBC news (their source: ADAM, WHO). Microcephaly effects 25,000 children each year in the US. "Brazil had fewer than 150 cases of microcephaly in the whole of 2014." Since October 2015, there have been 4,700 reported cases, but only 404 confirmed. There certainly is a spike, but no where near the 25,000 in the US.

Also, from what I have been reading, with the cases of microcephaly found in babies, the Zika virus has been present in some of those cases, but no one can clearly confirm that the Zika virus is the cause. Reading articles from CDC and WHO, they often use the phrase "may cause." Things aren't certain, but certainly interesting!