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The mission of the Global Health Working Group is to explore and improve current and emerging states of health and human security worldwide.

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This Working Group is focused on exploring current and emerging states of health and human security worldwide.
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Aboubacar Conte admin Albert Gomez Allan Anthony Carrielaj
Chisina Kapungu ChrisAllen Corey Watts CPetry DeannaPolk Elhadj Drame
Gavin Macgregor... Hadiatou Balde hank_test jranck JSole Kathy Gilbeaux
Lisa Stelly Thomas loguest Maeryn Obley mdmcdonald MDMcDonald_me_com Mika Shimizu
mike kraft njchapman Norea Tiaji Salaam-Blyther tnovotny

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Hawaii on High Alert of Dangerous Mosquitoes

america.aljazeera.com - February 16, 2016

Dr. Gavin MacGregor-Skinner, the director of disaster response at Harvard Medical School Teaching Hospital, weighs in on Zika and other mosquito-borne diseases.

http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/morning-news/2016/2/hawaii-on-high-alert-of-dangerous-mosquitoes.html

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Zika - List of Map Resources

An expanding list of map resources related to Zika virus . . .

Map - PAHO | WHO - Zika
http://ais.paho.org/phip/viz/ed_zika_countrymap.asp

HealthMap - 2016 Zika Outbreak
http://www.healthmap.org/zika/#timeline

CDC - All Countries and Territories with Active Zika Virus Transmission
http://www.cdc.gov/zika/geo/active-countries.html

FRONTLINE - The Spread of Zika
http://apps.frontline.org/zika/

2016 Zika Linked Microcephaly / Fetal Brain Disruption Sequence
https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1RcVTrkYW6hax_iITjKUkEcBCVeI

Zika Virus - Zika Virus in United States, Territories, and Canada
https://www.google.com/maps/d/embed?mid=zv94AJqgUct4.kT4qLMXp3SLU&hl=en
OR
https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?hl=en&hl=en&authuser=0&authuser=0&mid=zv94AJqgUct4.kT4qLMXp3SLU

Zika Virus - Mexico
https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=z-BJanWB3osk.kZw-wZDiyK14&hl=en_US 

 

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Map - PAHO | WHO - Zika

Geographic distribution of confirmed cases of Zika virus
(locally acquired) in countries and territories of the Americas, 2015-2016

http://ais.paho.org/phip/viz/ed_zika_countrymap.asp

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Microcephaly Cases in Brazil Predate Zika Virus Outbreak, Study Says

Zika and microcephaly questions

Cases may have been under-reported before the arrival of the virus

CLICK HERE - Microcephaly in northeastern Brazil: a review of 16 208 births between 2012 and 2015 (11 page .PDF file)

cbc.ca - February 10, 2016

Large numbers of babies with borderline normal head sizes were born in Brazil as far back as 2012, two years before the Zika virus is thought to have entered the country, say researchers searching for answers to urgent questions.

Pediatric cardiologist Dr. Sandra Mattos had been collecting data on 100,000 newborns in the Brazilian state of Paraiba as part of her work studying and treating congenital heart disease.

The microcephaly fears linked to the Zika virus drove her team to check back into hospital records for head circumferences of more than 1,600 babies born in the state in the last four years.

"We were very, very surprised," Mattos said. Babies with mild microcephaly were present in the population dating back to at least 2012.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

 

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Zika Virus: Link with Two Disorders Expected to Be Confirmed Within Weeks

             

WHO’s assistant director general Marie-Paule Kieny at news briefing in Geneva on Friday. Photograph: Pierre Albouy/Reuters

Vaccines at least 18 months off, WHO says, as scientists work to determine if virus causes microcephaly and Guillain-Barré

theguardian.com - February 12, 2016

The World Health Organisation expects the suspected link between the Zika virus and two neurological disorders, microcephaly in babies and Guillain-Barré syndrome in adults, to be established within weeks, a senior official has said.

Marie-Paule Kieny, the WHO’s assistant director general, told a news briefing on Friday: “We have a few more weeks to be sure to demonstrate causality, but the link between Zika and Guillain-Barré is highly probable.”

She said it would take at least 18 months to start clinical trials of potential vaccines on humans, adding: “Two vaccine candidates seem to be more advanced: a DNA vaccine from the US National Institutes of Health; and an inactivated product from Bharat Biotech, in India.”

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

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Argentine & Brazilian Doctors Suspect Mosquito Insecticide as Cause of Microcephaly

          

Since 2014, the insecticide Pyriproxyfen has been used to kill mosquitos in water tanks in Brazil. Water tank in Bahia state, northeast Brazil. Photo: Francois Le Minh via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND).

gmwatch.org - by Claire Robinson - February 10, 2016

A report from the Argentine doctors’ organisation, Physicians in the Crop-Sprayed Towns,[1] challenges the theory that the Zika virus epidemic in Brazil is the cause of the increase in the birth defect microcephaly among newborns.  

The increase in this birth defect, in which the baby is born with an abnormally small head and often has brain damage, was quickly linked to the Zika virus by the Brazilian Ministry of Health. However, according to the Physicians in the Crop-Sprayed Towns, the Ministry failed to recognise that in the area where most sick people live, a chemical larvicide that produces malformations in mosquitoes was introduced into the drinking water supply in 2014. This poison, Pyriproxyfen, is used in a State-controlled programme aimed at eradicating disease-carrying mosquitoes. . . .

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Study Finds Zika Virus in Fetal Brain, a Clue in Outbreak

         

abcnews.go.com - by Lauran Neergaard - February 10, 2016

CLICK HERE - NEJM - STUDY - Zika Virus Associated with Microcephaly

CLICK HERE - NEJM - EDITORIAL - Zika Virus and Microcephaly

New details about the possible effects of the Zika virus on the fetal brain emerged Wednesday as U.S. health officials say mosquito eradication here and abroad is key to protect pregnant women until they can develop a vaccine.

European researchers uncovered an extremely abnormal brain — not only a fraction of the proper size but lacking the usual crinkly neural folds — in a fetus whose mother suffered Zika symptoms at the end of the first trimester while she was living in Brazil. . . .

. . . Whether the mosquito-borne virus really causes microcephaly isn't yet proven, but Wednesday's report in The New England Journal of Medicine offers additional biologic clues.

"This fetus was really devastated," said Dr. Michael Greene of Massachusetts General Hospital who with colleagues from Harvard reviewed the findings in an accompanying editorial.

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Obama Asks for $1.8 Billion in Emergency Zika Funding

           

Anthony Fauci (R), director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Disease and Anne Schuchat of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention speak with reporters during a press briefing about the Zika virus at the White House in Washington February 8, 2016  REUTERS/KEVIN LAMARQUE

CLICK HERE - The White House - FACT SHEET: Preparing for and Responding to the Zika Virus at Home and Abroad

CLICK HERE - CDC Emergency Operations Center moves to highest level of activation for Zika response

reuters.com - by Roberta Rampton and Ben Hirschler - February 8, 2016

President Barack Obama will ask the U.S. Congress for more than $1.8 billion in emergency funds to fight Zika at home and abroad and pursue a vaccine, the White House said on Monday, but he added there is no reason to panic over the mosquito-borne virus.

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Pandora’s Box: How GM Mosquitos Could Have Caused the Zika Virus Outbreak

counterpunch.org - by Oliver Tickell - February 2, 2016

(Please note: This article includes links to all research and other articles cited)

. . . this is the key question: how – if indeed Zika really is the problem, as appears likely – did this relatively innocuous virus acquire the ability to produce these terrible malformations in unborn human babies? . . .

. . . an interesting aspect of the matter which has escaped mainstream media attention: the correlation between the incidence of Zika and the area of release of genetically modified Aedes aegypti mosquitos engineered for male insterility . . .

. . . a highly significant possibility: that Oxitec’s release of its GM mosquitos led directly to the development of Brazil’s microcephaly epidemic through the following mechanism:

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

 

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Bharat Biotech Says Working on Two Possible Zika Vaccines

           

A municipal health worker shows off a test tube with larvae of Zika virus vector, the Aedes aegypti mosquito, as part of the city's efforts to prevent the spread of the Zika, in Guatemala City, Guatemala, February 2, 2016.  REUTERS/JOSUE DECAVELE

in.reuters.com - by ZEBA SIDDIQUI - February 3, 2016

Indian biotechnology company Bharat Biotech said on Wednesday it was working on two possible vaccines to fight the Zika virus, which has been linked to birth defects in thousands of babies in Brazil.

The virus is spreading rapidly in the Americas, and WHO officials on Tuesday expressed concern that it could hit Africa and Asia as well. No vaccine has been developed so far.

One of the possible vaccines is "recombinant", which means it is created by genetic engineering, while the other was "inactivated", and will enter pre-clinical trials in animals in two weeks, Bharat Biotech managing director Krishna Ella told Reuters.

(READ COMPLETE ARTICLE)

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