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Japan confirms new case of Zika virus

Xinhua, March 11, 2016 Adjust font size:

Japan's Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare on Friday confirmed another case of a patient here being infected with the Zika virus after returning to Japan last month after a trip to Brazil.

The ministry said the case involves a woman in her thirties who is believed to have been infected by the mosquito-borne virus during a two-week trip to Brazil ending late last month.

The woman resides in Aichi Prefecture, in central Japan, and is a foreign national, the ministry said, stating that the case was confirmed after she had complained of rashes, a fever and joint pains to her local physician. The ministry declined to reveal her nationality or whether the woman was pregnant or not.

The latest case follows the ministry last month confirming that a male teenager in Kawasaki Prefecture, near Tokyo, had been infected with the virus also following a trip to Brazil.

Ministry officials said the young male had visited Brazil for a 12-day vacation through Feb. 20 with his family and was found to have had a fever on the last day of his trip, with other symptoms such as a rash developing after his return to Japan.

Friday's case in Japan is now the fifth on record, with three others found to have been infected prior to the current epidemic in Latin America, after trips to Bora Bora island in French Polynesia and Koh Samui in Thailand, in 2013 and 2014.

The World Health Organization has said that an outbreak of the virus, which can cause birth defects in new-born babies, was detected in Brazil in May last year, and is now a "public health emergency of international concern."

As the mosquito- borne virus continues to spread predominantly in Central and South America, the health ministry here has said that all domestic medical facilities are to report any cases diagnosed to the ministry.

The ministry also said that it intends to designate the virus in a category that requires that it must be reported to doctors and has made provisions for testing kits to be distributed to medical facilities around the country, while actively warning pregnant women at airports not to travel to countries affected by the virus.

It also said that quarantine stations to screen possible carriers may also be set up nationwide, following further government approval.

While a vaccine to treat the virus is currently unavailable, the health ministry previously tried to allay fears here about the virus - which has been linked to microcephaly, a condition marked by babies being born with abnormally small heads that can result in developmental problems - spreading, following the previous confirmed case last month.

It said then that as Japan was "not in a season when mosquitoes are active," the risk of infection spreading was "extremely low." Endit