World Health Organization calls emergency meeting on Zika virus as spread across the Americas looms

The World Health Organization will hold an International Health Regulations Emergency Committee meeting on February 1 to determine whether the outbreak and spread of the Zika virus constitutes a public health emergency of international concern.

World Health Organization Director-General Margaret Chan will convene the International Health Regulations Emergency Committee in Geneva, Switzerland, WHO said on Thursday.

"The level of concern is high, as is the level of uncertainty," Chan reportedly told her organization's executive board members. "We need to get some answers quickly."

WHO predicts 3 to 4 million people could be infected with the Zika virus in the Americas this year. It is spread by mosquito bite. Most people will not develop symptoms, but the virus has been linked to brain defects and neurological disorders and neonatal malformations in babies.

Arrival of the virus has coincided with a steep increase in the birth of babies with abnormally small heads and Guillain-Barré syndrome, a poorly understood condition in which the immune system attacks the nervous system, sometimes resulting in paralysis, according to WHO. No U.S. cases have been reported.

The Zika virus was first detected in 1947 in a monkey in Uganda and since then has been found along the equator from Africa into Asia, according to published reports. Nine years ago, new cases popped up in islands in the Pacific Ocean.

The first case linked to birth defects was reported in Brazil in May 2015, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The virus has since spread within Brazil and to 22 other countries and territories in the region, according to WHO.

In response, the CDC has issued a travel alert for people traveling to regions and countries where the Zika virus transmission is ongoing.

A British company, Oxitec has developed a genetically modified mosquito to reduce the population that carries the Zika virus and other tropical diseases, according to  National Public Radio.

Females mated with the genetically modified male mosquitoes lay eggs that hatch but the larvae die before adulthood, NPR said. Oxitec has conducted trials in Brazil and other countries that show a 90 percent decline in the wild mosquito population.

In this country, Oxitec is currently awaiting FDA approval to conduct trials in the Florida Keys, NPR said.

WHO said it will prioritize the development of vaccines and new tools to control mosquito populations, as well as improving diagnostic tests.

The United States is expected to start vaccine trials in people by the end of the year.

The most common symptoms of Zika virus disease are fever, rash, joint pain, and conjunctivitis. The illness is usually mild with symptoms lasting from several days to a week. Severe disease requiring hospitalization is uncommon.

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The biggest danger is to pregnant women and their babies.

WHO's Regional Office for the Americas has been working closely with affected countries since May 2015, mobilizing staff and members of the Global Outbreak and Response Network to assist ministries of health in strengthening their abilities to detect the arrival and circulation of Zika virus through laboratory testing and rapid reporting.

The aim has been to ensure accurate clinical diagnosis and treatment for patients, to track the spread of the virus and the mosquito that carries it, and to promote prevention, especially through mosquito control, WHO said.

The organization is supporting the scaling up and strengthening of surveillance systems in countries that have reported cases of Zika and also in countries to which the virus may spread, it said. 

Twitter: @SusanJMorse