Girl With Zika Birth Defect Born at NJ Hospital

Girl With Zika Birth Defect Born at NJ Hospital

The mother was apparently infected in her home country of Honduras, reports indicate

WebMD News from HealthDay

By Steven Reinberg

HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, June 1, 2016 (HealthDay News) -- A woman from Honduras who apparently became infected with the Zika virus in her home country gave birth Tuesday in a New Jersey hospital to a baby girl with the birth defect characteristic of the disease, officials said.

The baby has an abnormally small head, a condition called microcephaly that also results in an underdeveloped brain, hospital officials said.

Dr. Manny Alvarez, chairman of the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Science at Hackensack University Medical Center, said the 31-year-old mother knew she was infected with the virus before coming to visit relatives in New Jersey. Scans performed late last week showed the girl was underweight for her gestational age, so doctors delivered the baby by cesarean section, The New York Times reported.

Alvarez said he believes the baby is the first baby born in the Northeast with Zika infection, which is typically transmitted by mosquitoes.

"It tells you that Zika is real," he said. "There is still a lot of work to be done insofar as controlling this virus."

A baby was born in Hawaii earlier this year with microcephaly.

On Monday, U.N. health officials recommended that women planning to become pregnant should wait at least eight weeks before trying to conceive if they or their partner live in -- or are returning from -- areas where Zika virus infections are occurring,.

The vast majority of Zika infections have occurred in Latin America, with Brazil the hot zone with an estimated 5,000 cases of microcephaly. There have been no reports of Zika-induced microcephaly contracted in the United States. But U.S. health officials have said they expect to see Zika infections in Gulf Coast states such as Florida, Louisiana and Texas as mosquito season picks up.

Mosquito bites remain the most common source of infection of the Zika virus. But transmission of the virus through sex is more common than previously thought, World Health Organization officials said Monday. They had previously recommended a four-week abstinence before trying to conceive.

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