Brazilian lab detects Zika in saliva, urine

Most people with the virus have no symptoms, or experience only mild symptoms like fever, headache and rash.

Brazil is considered by some as ground zero in the battle against the disease.

But senior USA health officials are calling for restraint following these reports and are urging people not jump to conclusions.

In a statement posted to its website Thursday, the ministry said that two-thirds of the material gathered during recent field work with an American team would be shipped to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Pregnant moms & mothers should also take extra precautions to avoid saliva (kissing) and other bodily fluid contact with those infected with the Zika virus.

The Zika virus has been found in the saliva and urine of two patients in Brazil, as reported by Firstpost.

Mayberry, a Space, Environmental, Food & Nutritional Toxicologist, publicly stated that the Zika virus could be transmitted sexually.

Zika is a mosquito transmitted virus, that is, it is a viral toxin that is transmitted via mosquito bite as well as through unprotected sexual contact with a person.

The guidelines were in response to the report Tuesday by Dallas health officials that a local resident was infected with Zika by having sex with someone who’d contracted the disease while traveling in Venezuela – one of the many countries in South America, Central America and the Caribbean where the virus is spreading explosively. Gadelha underscored that the discovery needn’t alter Carnival plans for anyone but pregnant women. This of particular concern as mosquito season approaches across the Deep South. The virus is spread by two kinds of mosquitoes typically found in the region.

Indications by the centre for immigration studies in Washington estimates that as many as 36,000 birth tourists go to the United States every year and further identifies that Nigerians represent a strong number of guests from Sub-Saharan Africa. Brazilian researchers have pointed to a suspected link between pregnant women’s infection with the virus and a rare birth defect in babies.

The researchers, who cautioned any link between Zika and global warming remains unproven, said violent storms, floods and drought are prone to fostering the outbreak and spread of diseases, particularly in underdeveloped nations.

“With the risk of incidence of new infections of Zika virus in many countries, and the potential linkage of the Zika virus infection with microcephaly and other clinical effect, it is estimated as an appropriate precautionary measure to defer (blood) donors who return from areas with Zika virus outbreak”, World Health Organization spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said. The virus has also been linked to a potentially paralysing nerve disorder called Guillain-Barre syndrome.

“Two patients have been brought to the attention of the Department of Health by their physicians to determine if they should be tested for Zika virus given travel history and symptoms, ” he said, adding that patients meeting the case definition would also be tested for chikungunya and dengue as appropriate.

“How can they … not offer (women) … the possibility to stop their pregnancies if they wish?” she said.

US health officials say men who have visited an area with the Zika virus should use condoms if they have sex with a pregnant woman – for the entire duration of the pregnancy.

The mosquito-borne virus has spread to at least 29 countries. A rainy, humid winter already had mosquito control officials on alert statewide and door-to-door inspections have been increased in neighborhoods where 14 cases of Zika were reported in seven counties, all from people who have traveled overseas.