Publicación:

Characterization of Lethal Zika Virus Infection in AG129 Mice.

Resumen en inglés

Zika virus (ZIKV; Flaviviridae, Flavivirus) has emerged out of Africa and caused outbreaks of febrile disease in Yap islands of the Federated states of Micronesia [1], French Polynesia [2], and Oceania; and in late 2015 Brazil reported the first known local transmission of ZIKV in the Americas [3]. The current outbreak in the Americas is cause for great concern because ZIKV appears to be spreading nearly uncontrolled with at least 24 countries and territories experiencing autochthonous spread, including Puerto Rico. Eventual local spread in the southern United States seems inevitable. Clinically, infection with ZIKV resembles dengue fever and several other arboviral diseases [4], but has been linked to neurological syndromes and congenital malformation [5,6]. Alarmingly, the rate of microcephaly (small head, reduced brain size, impaired neurocognitive development) in infants born to pregnant women has increased significantly (20-fold in 2015) in areas with high ZIKV incidence in Brazil [7]. There is increasing evidence that ZIKV infection may be causing this and other birth defects [6]; resulting in numerous CDC travel advisories and several countries recommending women delay pregnancy for up to two years. Prior to this, ZIKV existed in relative obscurity with only sporadic human infections until the end of the last century.