Zika virus outbreaks and opportunity to improve healthcare

Context: There is a need to optimally use the lab for COVID-19 to conduct testing for other emerging infections such as zika virus.
Background

• In 1947, the Zika virus was discovered in rhesus monkeys in Uganda’s Zika forest.
• In 2007, the first Zika virus epidemic was discovered on the Pacific island of Yap.
• The Zika virus epidemic was declared a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC) by the World Health Organization on February 1, 2016.

Additional Information
Zika Virus

• Zika virus is primarily a mosquito-borne illness which is transmitted by the Aedes Mosquitoes (which transmit chikungunya and dengue).
• Zika virus is transmitted from infected mother to fetus during pregnancy, through blood and other body floods and organ translation as well as sexual contact.
• The symptoms are very similar to other common viral illnesses.
• This virus is an enveloped positive-sense RNA genome that can be translated into viral proteins
• It mutated into two strains called the Asian Strain and the African Strain
• A definitive treatment for Zika Virus has yet not been found and no vaccines have been approved.

Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC)

• The International Health Regulation (2005) defines a PHEIC as an unusual occurrence that is determined to pose a public health risk to other States through the international transmission of illness and to need a coordinated international response.
• Public Health Emergency of International Concern refers to a scenario that is dangerous, uncommon, or unexpected and has public health ramifications beyond the affected State’s national boundary and may necessitate prompt international response.

Recent PHEIC declarations

• The 2009 H1N1 (or swine flu) pandemic
• The 2014 Polio declaration
• The 2014 outbreak of Ebola in Western Africa
• The 2015–16 Zika virus epidemic
• The ongoing 2018–20 Kivu Ebola epidemic, and
• The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.