Definition of Epidemiology- this is the study of health and diseases in a particular population by identifying the category of people prone to a certain illness, determine whether the disease spread is changing with time and identify the geographical area of a community most likely to have the disease than others. In this essay, we are going to discuss the re-emergence and spread of Zika virus in parts of southern America early this year.
From the first discovery of the virus about 70 years ago in the year 1947, Zika virus has been emerging from time to time in different parts of the world at different times. In February this year, the virus was reported in Brazil, and it spread rapidly in Recife, which is a habitat for close to 4 million people ( Duffy, Chen, Hancock, Powers, Kool, Lanciotti, & Guillaumot, (2009). The world health organization warned that the infection was likely to spread to many countries in Americas.
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The findings of the research on the virus indicated that the virus is transmitted be Aedes aegypti, a mosquito species that thrives well in stagnant water pools and proliferates across Brazilian cities during the country's hot and wet summers. The study that involved the testing of amnion fluids obtained from two women, whose fetuses had been diagnosed with microcephaly indicated presence of Zika virus genome. The virus was not detected in their urine or serum. Tests for Dengue virus, herpes simplex virus, H.I.V, rubella virus and chikungunya virus tested negative.
After several complete genome examination of the samples Taken from isolated case of patient 1, the Brazilian Zika virus phylogenetic analysis indicated that the virus shared 97-100% of its genomic characteristics obtained during an outbreak in French Polynesia in 2003. The assessment on the possibility of a recombination event between the Zika virus and other flaviviruses, the hypothesis, ruled out that the Brazilian virus genome was a recombination strain with other mosquito flaviviruses.
These results further support the relationship between Zika virus and cases of microcephaly in neonates in Brazil. The findings further suggest the virus can cross the placenta barrier. In conclusion, the virus should be considered as a potentially infectious agent of human fetuses (Calvet, Aguiar, Melo, Sampaio, de Filippis, Fabri, & Tschoeke, 2016).
Both the media piece and the scholarly piece discussed in this study focuses on detailed information about the spread, effects symptoms and the possible ways of preventing the spread of Zika virus. It also shows the importance of the epidemiology, such that it helps in the Imposition of quarantine and travel advisory to the areas prone to the infection, in the effort of safeguarding and keeping the population healthy.
Trials and experiment study was used in this case. As per the article, amniotic fluids from two pregnant women, whose fetuses had tested positive with microcephaly was used. After centrifuging the amniotic fluids, the acquisition of both the DNA and RNA was done from the virus particles, before the genome identification. The observation of the reconstruction and recombination events of the Zika virus genome, indicated similarities with other Zika strains and flaviviruses which occurs in the same region in Brazil (de Paula Freitas, de Oliveira Dias, Prazeres, Sacramento, Ko, Maia, & Belfort, 2016).
References
Calvet, G., Aguiar, R. S., Melo, A. S., Sampaio, S. A., de Filippis, I., Fabri, A., ... & Tschoeke, D. A. (2016). Detection and sequencing of Zika virus from amniotic fluid of fetuses with microcephaly in Brazil: a case study. The Lancet Infectious Diseases .
de Paula Freitas, B., de Oliveira Dias, J. R., Prazeres, J., Sacramento, G. A., Ko, A. I., Maia, M., & Belfort, R. (2016). Ocular findings in infants with microcephaly associated with presumed Zika virus congenital infection in Salvador, Brazil. JAMA ophthalmology .
Duffy, M. R., Chen, T. H., Hancock, W. T., Powers, A. M., Kool, J. L., Lanciotti, R. S., ... & Guillaumot, L. (2009). Zika virus outbreak on Yap Island, federated states of Micronesia. New England Journal of Medicine , 360 (24), 2536-2543.
