Mexico

Zika During Pregnancy Does Not Necessarily Cause Microcephaly: Health Secretariat

14 of April 2016

Research into a Zika is ongoing, but requires a lot of time and energy,photo: Notimex/Hugo Borges

In Mexico there have not been any cases of microcephaly documented among 53 women infected with the zika virus during pregnancy, says Pablo Kuri Morales

Undersecretary for Prevention and Promotion of Health, Pablo Kuri Morales, said contracting the zika disease does not necessarily mean that a pregnant woman will give birth to a baby with microcephaly.

In Mexico there have not been any documented cases among 53 women infected with the virus during pregnancy, he said in a conference, in which he announced five specialists in maternal medicine will be hired to train doctors in Guerrero, Quintana Roo, Chiapas, Oaxaca and Campeche, states with the highest number of cases.

He said you can not to panic about the relationship between zika and microcephaly (smaller than normal head size) shown in a recently published study in the New England Journal of Medicine study, because the scientific criteria is not yet conclusive.

In this regard the official of the Health Secretariat said the study by the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, did not define how many in a hundred or a thousand women can have a child with microcephaly, so it requires further investigation.

Kuri Morales explained that of the 53 pregnant women who have had zika, seven have already had their babies without showing signs of microcephaly, while of the remaining 46, nine are in the first trimester, 27 in the second and 10 in the last trimester.

“Zika in pregnant women does not mean microcephaly, this has to be very clear, because otherwise people can fall into an overreaction or panic that is not justified.

“Zika in pregnant women means there is a probability — today information we have — still very low, or at least as we see it in the available data, that this could happen,” he said.

He said that unfortunately, not until 28th week of pregnancy (to start the third trimester) can you tell whether or not the baby has microcephaly, a point when abortion is no longer recommended.

Therefore, he reiterated the recommendation to avoid the proliferation of aedes aegypti mosquito, which transmits dengue, Chikungunya and Zika, and maintain the strategy of washing, cleaning, changing and throwing away any container where water can collect, it becomes a breeding ground for the insect.

The Center for Disease Control maintains that the zika virus certainly causes microcephaly.