South Africa reported its first case of the virus last week, but it says the patient has made a full recovery and that there’s little chance of an outbreak. The patient’s been identified as a Columbian businessman, he’d contracted the illness abroad and started showing symptoms four days after he arrived in South Africa.
The virus is transmitted by mosquitoes not human contact. So officials here are not expecting an outbreak but there may be more imported cases – of patients and the Zika-carrying mosquito.
Monitoring of vectors is very, very important. Diagnostics are in place. At this stage nobody has got vaccines and nobody has specific anti-virals.’ Professor Janusz Paweska, National Institute for Communicable Diseases
Hundreds of thousands of people are thought to be infected in parts of South America. The virus can cause under-development of unborn babies specifically their heads.
‘One obvious one is, if you don’t have to, don’t travel to the countries which are currently affected, with this epidemic, where the ZIKA virus transmission occurs, actively’Professor Janusz Paweska, National Institute for Communicable Diseases
While we have had one confirmed case in South Africa, theres no need to panic. The systems are in place and all you have to do, when you’re traveling to countries that have got this infection, that is happening at the moment, is be careful. Take the normal precautions you would take if you were going into a malaria are.
