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Report: 2 Pregnant Utah Women with Zika Lost Their Babies

Posted on March 15, 2017

In the past five months, two pregnant women in Utah lost their babies in the first trimester after contracting Zika, according to a state health department report released Monday.

The report by Utah’s department of health shows that since the beginning of last year, 11 pregnant women have contracted Zika in Utah.

Amy Steele, an epidemiologist at Utah’s Department of Health, said eight of those pregnant women did not pass on the virus to their children and one woman left Utah and wasn’t tracked.

The two women who did pass on Zika to their unborn babies were in their first trimester of pregnancy when they contracted the virus while traveling outside of the country.

“Two dying in the first trimester due to Zika seems to align with what they have found in Brazil and in the states,” said Steele.

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Zika-infected Pregnant Women 20X More likely To Birth Baby with Birth Defects

Posted on March 5, 2017

Pregnant women infected with the Zika virus are 20 times more likely to have a baby born with certain birth defects as mothers who gave birth before the Zika epidemic began, U.S. health officials reported Thursday.

Even worse, “when you look just at brain abnormalities and microcephaly, what we are seeing is more than 30 times higher than the prevalence before Zika was introduced to the Americas,” said Margaret Honein. She is chief of the birth defects branch at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

With microcephaly, babies are born with a smaller-than-normal head and an underdeveloped brain. Since the mosquito-borne virus first began to spread through South America in April 2015, thousands of babies have been born with Zika-linked microcephaly. The large majority have been born in Brazil, but the consequences of Zika infection during pregnancy are now being seen in the United States.

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BumpNews

Zika Report: More than Half of Brazilian Women Avoiding Pregnancy

Posted on December 24, 2016

In a nation where Abortion is illegal and has been the hardest hit by the Zika virus epidemic, Brazil has seen a precipitous drop in pregnancies. According to a letter published in the BMJ Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care, 56% of women surveyed said that they avoided getting pregnant because of Zika

Brazil leads the world in confirmed cases of infection with nearly 110,000 cases, according to the Pan American Health Organization. As a result of the infections, there have been over 2,200 cases of congenital Zika syndrome in babies (microcephaly) born to women infected with the virus.

The report revealed some detailed insights. More black and non-white women said they didn’t want to get pregnant as did women in the northeastern part of the country, the area most hit by the virus. The latest report from a Brazilian scientist studying the impact that the epidemic is having on reproductive choices shows that the consequences of the Zika outbreak may be long lasting. In a brief . More women in the hardest hit areas of Brazil, in the northeastern part of the country, said they didn’t want to get pregnant, as well as more black and non–white women.

The report says that the findings should alert government officials to the urgent need to address reproductive health options for women. Better access and more options for birth control should also be a priority to give women longer term control over their reproductive health, the report says.

h/t Time

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Celebrity

Zika: Olympic Volleyball Player Learned of Her Pregnancy right before Rio

Posted on August 16, 2016

Now that Puerto Rico’s Diana Reyes volleyball team is out of the Olympics after their failure to advance, the pregnant athlete should hopefully be heading home…at least for the sake of her unborn child, given Zika risks.

Right before departing for Rio this Summer, Reyes got into a really bad car accident which forced her to the ER. During a follow up check up, she got the shocking news that she was two months pregnant.

Reyes didn’t let the Zika fears stop her from pursing her Olympic Dream.

Leading up to the Olympics started, the World Health Organization reported close to 100,000 cases of Zika and Rio had three times the number of cases than any other state in Brazil.

Reyes said: “I learned of the pregnancy two days before travelling. I can play, there is no restriction. Our coach congratulated me and knows I can play. I’m waiting for my chance.”

Brazilian outlet Globo Esporte reports Reyes only told her team-mates once they arrived in Rio.

Reyes was not involved in Puerto Rico’s first two matches but played in the final match.

In pregnant women, the Zika virus immediately attacks the fetus, etching away at brain development. Babies born to mothers carrying Zika are often diagnosed with microcephaly, a condition in which the baby’s skull is too small for its brain, crushing the brain and causing severe damage.

Hopefully, Reyes is heading home though the US has declared Puerto Rico’s Zika outbreak a public health emergency. She has to be careful there too.

Oy!

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News

Sadly, Zika claims Life of Texas Baby

Posted on August 10, 2016

The Zika virus has claimed the life of a Texas baby,health officials reported Tuesday.

The baby, whose mother had traveled to Latin America during her pregnancy, died shortly after birth. The infant was born with microcephaly, a condition in which a baby’s head is abnormally small and, in most cases, brain development is incomplete.

The baby was born in Harris County, which includes Houston. It’s the first Zika-related death in Texas.

Zika-related brain damage in fetuses “is one of the saddest congenital birth outcomes imaginable,” said Peter Hotez, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. “The case highlights that ZIka is not just producing babies with small heads. . . .We should expect many similar deaths, and also stillbirths.”

Fifteen babies in the U.S. have been born with Zika-related birth defects, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Seven women have lost pregnancies due to Zika. Those numbers could grow. Nearly 1,000 pregnant women in the continental U.S. and territories have been infected with Zika.

Miami is battling a local Zika outbreak in the Wynwood neighborhood that has infected 21 people, according to the Florida Department of Health.

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News

Pregnant and Scared in Miami’s Zika Hot Zone

Posted on August 4, 2016

Jessica Ardente waited 36 years to have her first baby. Her parents will visit in two weeks to watch their grandson’s ultrasound. There are cribs and car seats to shop for, a nursery to decorate, and bottles, diapers and clothes to buy.

And now, on top of everything else, there is Zika to worry about.

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News

CDC: Men, No Sex for 6 Months if You Travel to Zika-Effected Region

Posted on June 7, 2016

Today, we’ve learned that the star player for the NBA‘s Golden State Warrior basketball team, Steph Curry, has decided to skip Summer’s Rio Olympics in order to let his injured knee heel properly in between seasons, ESPN reports.

Speculators believe he is also fearful of contracting Zika, a disease which results in flu-like symptoms to adult carriers but is sexually transmitted and can result in birth defects to an incubating fetus.

Curry and his wife Ayesha Curry have a wonderful franchise of their own in their adorable daughters Riley and Ryan Curry. If they were to accidentally build on #TeamCurry, they’d be risking the next member being negatively effected by Zika.

Also…here is another reason that married and/or sexually active speculators need to consider: the Centers for Disease Control recommends that men who travel to Zika-effected regions to abstain from sex or use condoms for six months after leaving the region if they start exhibiting symptoms of the disease.

SIX MONTHS?!?!?!?!?!? Whoa baby!

That’s right, the unknown nature of this virus has caused the agency to go even further given that symptoms may not show up immediately. It is recommended that men abstain altogether whether or not they have a positive test.

Well…there’s some motivation right there to keep some married men with wives of child-bearing age away, huh? (wink)

Of the 273 confirmed Zika cases on the U.S. mainland, 9 involve pregnant women. Six of those cases were transmitted sexually, the CDC said.

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News

STUDY: Zika is a Threat During Entire pregnancy, Not Just 1st Trimester

Posted on April 15, 2016

The Zika virus may pose a threat to women and their fetuses even in the later stages of pregnancy, according to a study published online Wednesday in The BMJ, formerly known as the British Medical Journal.

The new study is being published as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has concluded that Zika is a definitive cause of birth defects such as microcephaly, in which infants are born with abnormally small heads and, in most cases, incomplete brain development. Until Wednesday, the CDC had said that Zika was strongly linked to birth defects, but that there wasn’t enough scientific evidence to make a definitive conclusion.

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News

Olympics: Things get Real as CDC Tells Pregnant Athletes to Skip It

Posted on February 27, 2016

In a travel advisory Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reiterated that pregnant women consider not going to the 2016 Summer Olympic Games or to the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro because of the Zika virus outbreak in Brazil.

The agency issued the travel advisory along with its first report about infection with the mosquito-borne Zika virus in pregnant U.S. women. While the illness caused by the Zika virus is usually mild, the Brazilian outbreak has been especially concerning because of its link to a sharp rise in cases of microcephaly, a birth defect characterized by brain abnormalities and an unusually small head.

“We know Zika and microcephaly are associated, although we do not yet have definitive proof that Zika infection alone is the cause of microcephaly,” CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said at a press briefing, adding that “the evidence for this is getting stronger by the day.”

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News

CDC: Do Not Travel to These 13 Countries if You’re Pregnant

Posted on January 16, 2016

If you are pregnant or think you may be, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has just issued a travel alert warning pregnant women to avoid 13 countries in the Americas currently experiencing outbreak of a mosquito-born virus, Zika, that is in linked to an epidemic of birth defects in Brazil.

In the past few months in Brazil, there has been a report of over 3,500 cases of microcephaly, a rare birth defect, compared to the normal 100-200 cases revealed in that massive South American country each year. Some of the babies have died.

For that reason, the CDC issued a travel alert Friday evening, warning people about the risk and suggesting that pregnant women, in particular, avoid Brazil and twelve other nations in the Americas that have had high cases, according to the Pan American Health Organization: Colombia, El Salvador, French Guiana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Martinique, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Suriname and Venezuela

The CDC said women who cannot avoid traveling should consult their doctors and take steps to avoid mosquito bites, such as wearing long sleeves and pants. Women thinking of becoming pregnant should also consult their doctors before traveling to outbreak zones.

For the US, only the property of Puerto Rico has had a reported case, its first of Zika in December. The case was diagnosed in someone who had not traveled outside of Puerto Rico, suggesting that Zika is spreading there.

The symptoms of the virus are mild but the link to birth -defect makes it more serious.

Brazil also has reported dozens of cases of Guillain-Barre syndrome, a rare immune system disorder that can cause temporary paralysis, that appear related to Zika virus.

Yikes! Be careful, TTC moms and moms-to-be!

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