Brazil is hosting the Olympics this year and hundreds of thousands of travelers from around the world to Rio de Janeiro in August [Xinhua]Brazilian Health Minister Marcelo Castro has announced a new partnership with scientists at the University of Texas that could lead to laboratory development of a vaccine within a year.
The government believes that as many as 1.5 million Brazilians may have been infected by Zika so far.
Full-fledged availability of a vaccine against the mosquito-borne virus would take longer, the Minister warned.
Castro on Thursday said the two institutions —— Brazil’s Evandro Chagas Institute and the University of Texas —— will work to speed up initial research, and a vaccine might be ready for a two—year test in 12 months.
“We know it will take time but we are optimistic that we can develop the vaccine in a shorter time,” said Castro.
The Brazilian government will invest $2 million in the project while the amount to be invested by the US side is yet to be disclosed.
Scientists are investigating a potential link between infections of pregnant women and more than 4,000 suspected cases in Brazil of microcephaly, a condition marked by abnormally small head size that can result in developmental problems.
Brazil is considered by some as ground zero in the battle against the disease.
New reports have emerged suggesting there is a possibility it could be carried from an infected person to a new human host via saliva and urine.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the US, the Zika disease is a virus spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito.
It was first reported in a monkey living in the Zika Forest in Uganda in 1947, and spread to humans in Africa and Asia within a few years.
The Aedes mosquito bites an infected person and then carries the virus to another person it bites. The virus is transmitted from a mother to a child during pregnancy or birth.
TBP and Agencies
Source