From Sky News: http://news.sky.com/story/1631065/zika-virus-may-have-spread-to-common-mosquito Well, if they are right... crap.
Well, yes, eventually everyone dies. Heck if I know. Honestly I hadn't even heard about it until today when I saw that article. Apparently it sprang up in November, and has spread to 24 different countries in South and Central America, and some islands close-ish to the western edge of North Africa. According to the article:
January 28, 2016 @ 1537 The World Health Organization announced Thursday that it will convene an emergency meeting to try to find ways to stop the transmission of the Zika virus — which officials said is "spreading explosively" across the Americas. "The level of alarm is extremely high, as is the level of uncertainty. Questions abound. We need to get some answers quickly, " Margaret Chan, director general of the WHO, said in Geneva in a briefing for member countries. The WHO said the pathogen, which was virtually unheard of in the region a year ago, is spreading so fast it could infect as many as 3 to 4 million people within 12 months. Chan said those numbers as well as the severity of the possible conditions that are being reported -- from brain defects in children to paralysis in adults -- make the situation dramatically different from what epidemiologists have seen with the virus in the past. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...ency-committee-level-of-alarm-extremely-high/
Zika virus Fact sheet Updated January 2016 Key facts Zika virus disease is caused by a virus transmitted by Aedes mosquitoes. People with Zika virus disease usually have a mild fever, skin rash (exanthema) and conjunctivitis. These symptoms normally last for 2-7 days. There is no specific treatment or vaccine currently available. The best form of prevention is protection against mosquito bites. The virus is known to circulate in Africa, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific. Introduction Zika virus is an emerging mosquito-borne virus that was first identified in Uganda in 1947 in rhesus monkeys through a monitoring network of sylvatic yellow fever. It was subsequently identified in humans in 1952 in Uganda and the United Republic of Tanzania. Outbreaks of Zika virus disease have been recorded in Africa, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific. Genre: Flavivirus Vector: Aedes mosquitoes (which usually bite during the morning and late afternoon/evening hours) Reservoir: Unknown Signs and Symptoms The incubation period (the time from exposure to symptoms) of Zika virus disease is not clear, but is likely to be a few days. The symptoms are similar to other arbovirus infections such as dengue, and include fever, skin rashes, conjunctivitis, muscle and joint pain, malaise, and headache. These symptoms are usually mild and last for 2-7 days. http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/zika/en/
In addition to the WHO information posted above, it has been possibly connected with Microcephaly births (children being born with abnormally small heads, possibly leading to inability to fully develop the brain and/or live). Although it's uncertain to me what specific properties of the virus might be affecting this.
zika has been around since like the 1940's , it's not manmade, the geneticly altered males that die without a certain chemical to impregnate the females so all their kids die and hopefully reduce the population of the mosquito enough to stop the current epidemic are manmade however. so ... yay? if the virus has spilled over into other mosquito species Bane Shift is ****ed up yo. minihead babies not cool
while there is no defenite proof of a link between the virus and microcephaly the dramatic increase in microcephalic babies since the start of the epidemic leads me to believe they'l awnser that question in a while. also theoretically an infected person may spread the disease to mosquitos and more humans in southern europe. who'se playing plague.inc ?stop it!
That seems to be the case, though of course it doesn't rule out the potential of being man-altered. Though there is of course no reason to believe that is the case at this time. In the mean time, keep your mosquito nets handy.