The Zika Infection

First of all an understanding of what a stem cell is, where it comes from, and the significance of it's medical potential is essential. Stem cells are the "master cells" that form the human body or whatever other animal it is from. Stem cells can be extracted from adult tissues, bone marrow, umbilical cord blood ( ), and embryos in the blastocyst stage. Although scientists have found ways to manipulate the stem cells from adult sources into other types of cells, they claim that they are less capable of deriving the desired tissue and are not "biologically equivalent" ( ) to stem cells extracted from embryos.

McNeil, Donald G., and Pam Belluck. "Extensive Brain Defects seen in Babies of Mothers with Zika." New York Times, 14 Dec, 2016, pp. A.3, SIRS Issues Researcher, https://sks.sirs.com.

The appearance and spread of the Zika virus inside the United States has recently made a huge impact on our society and healthcare professionals. The virus is being passed from an infected mother to her unborn child causing severe, life-altering disabilities and defects. More and more cases of the virus are being reported, with the biggest impact on the development of unborn babies. With no vaccine to protect against Zika, it is especially critical for pregnant women to take precautions when being exposed to mosquitoes, the primary vector for Zika.

Dr. Sarah Park, State Epidemiologist for the Hawaii State Department of Health responded to reporters last week about a baby that was born in a Hawaii hospital with a birth defect linked to the Zika virus. It was reported that this is the first case in the United States linked to the Zika virus. The Hawaii State Health Department said that the mother probably contracted the disease while she was living in Brazil last year and passed the disease to her child while her child was still in the womb. Dr. Parks assured the public that there was no risk of the virus spreading from this case and that the Zika virus is spread when a mosquito bites an infected person and then bites someone else. The disease is not transmitted person to person. Dr.

Great concerns have been made by the public on the outbreak of Zika virus (ZIKV), a mosquito-borne flavivirus, on the influences it may bring to human fetal. Numerous research have been made analysing the impact on human fetal if their mothers are being infected by ZIKA virus during pregnancy and there are still more to be revealed. Freitas et al. (2016) reports the ocular findings in infant with microcephaly (birth defect with abnormal smallness of head) while Mlakar et al. (2016) reveals the consequences of ZIKA with microcephaly.

What is the Zika virus? “For most people, the Zika virus causes only a brief, mild flu-like illness.” It may also affect pregnant women. “In pregnant women it has been linked to alarming increase in the rate of the birth defect known as microcephaly-- a debilitatingly small head and brain size.” It is so devastating to hear of children being born with abnormal heads (Brown).

Zika is a virus with no vaccine and no cure that can cause Microcephaly. Microcephaly is when a child’s brain has not developed properly and he or she is born with an abnormally small head.

For a couple of weeks now, a so-called epidemic of the Zika virus has been plastered all over the media’s health sections. Many people have ascribed the rise in the Zika virus as the leading cause to rise in the cases of Microcephaly (a condition where babies are born with abnormally small heads). This belief has become so strong that the WHO has even recommended that pregnant women not travel to areas affected with the Zika virus. As a result of these recent events, the question “ Does Zika actually cause microcephaly?” begs to be asked. The unfortunate answer to this question is that we don’t know. The article which I chose to read dealt with why it is so hard to ascribe microcephaly to the Zika virus and what we should do about it. In short, the reason why it is so hard to prove is

Zika is a disease that presence it’s self in pregnant women. It spreads through mosquitos and can be given to humans through there bite. The disease can also be spread sexually, but symptoms do not show in males. Symptoms of the disease are fever, rash, red eyes, and joint pain. This disease also causes the baby to have birth defects when being born. The birth defects occur in the brain of the baby, causing the brain to be smaller than average.

Zika virus has been shown to particularly target and destroy developing brain cells. This explains why brain conditions don’t occur often in adults, who have fully formed brains. However fetuses, whose brains are developing throughout pregnancy, can suffer from microcephaly and other possible congenital disorders due to this attack from Zika.

Scientist suspect that the mutation in the Zika virus, that causes the abnormally small sized heads and brains of babies, first showed up in 2013. Discovered decades ago the Zika virus is spread by mosquitoes, but wasn’t linked to high rates of microcephaly (a birth defect where a baby's head is smaller than expected when compared to other babies) until recently. Researchers, unsure as to why the birth defects were being caused by the virus, originally thought that it might have been the immune system of the people in South American that was causing the problems but a researcher, Shi, and a team in China hypothesized that these changes, were brought about by a change or mutation in the Zika virus.

What is the Zika virus? How is it diagnose? According to the World Health Organization, (WHO), Zika is a virus caused by a mosquito-borne flavivirus and was first identified in Uganda in 1947 in monkeys by a network that monitored yellow fever. It was later identified in humans in 1952 in Uganda and the United Republic of Tanzania. A diagnosis of Zika is

Zika virus is an emerging communicable disease first identified in Uganda in 1947. It was spotted in rhesus monkeys and recognized in persons in 1952 (Sikka et al., 2016). Later in 1973, there was an outbreak in Nigeria. In 2013 and 2014, it affected France with approximately twenty thousand people. It has been presumed to cause rare and minor symptoms. In 2015, it suddenly emerged in Brazil and spread in an explosive way through South America, the Caribbean, and Central America (Sirohi et al., 2016). In summer 2016, it arrived in the United States of America. Exploring Zika virus helps in creating an understanding of the emerging communicable disease through identifying its source, location, and the strategy of addressing it.

There are many places to obtain stem cells from: bone marrow, fat cells, umbilical cord blood, adult blood, olfactory nerve endings, skin cells, and the human embryo. There are two methods for retrieving a stem cell, using an embryo that has already been conceived or cloning an embryo using a cell from a patient and a donated egg (embryonic stem cells). And the adult stem cell found in tissue and cells (NIH). The human embryo has to be destroyed by scientists in order to obtain the stem cell making this as well as cloning an ethical dilemma.

in 1947, the virus first revealed itself through the blood of a rhesus macaque located inside of the Zika forest. After its discovery, no evidence suggested that the virus could cause human diseases. Nevertheless, serosurveys were conducted in various regions of Uganda. Through these surveys, a 6.1% seroprevalence of antibodies against Zika virus was discovered. This added insight on to the frequency of human infection. This virus generally transmits through the bite of an infected Aedes species mosquito. Individuals who contract this virus typically experience symptoms such as: “fever, rash, joint pain, and conjunctivitis.” The disease can often go