Zika virus tests advised for travellers

A Health Ministry employee fumigates a home against the Aedes aegypti mosquito to prevent the spread of the Zika virus in Soyapango, six km east of San Salvador, on January 21, 2016. AFP

Cambodians who have recently travelled to Africa or the Americas are advised to get a check-up if they are concerned over potentially being infected with the Zika virus, the Ministry of Health’s Centre for Disease Control Department (CDC) announced on Facebook yesterday.

CDC director Ly Sovan said that while Cambodia had its last Zika case in 2010, in which the patient fully recovered, the Ministry of Health is monitoring the mosquito-borne illness.

“We have a tracking system to monitor the Zika case . . . If people have a fever, we test them to see whether they contracted Zika,” he said, adding that if a positive case were to be found, that patient would be isolated as a precaution.

Following a confirmed case of the Zika virus in Taiwan by a man travelling from Thailand, the Taiwanese Centres for Disease Control issued a travel warning for several countries in the region.

“As the first case in Taiwan was imported from the region, Taiwan CDC decided to raise the travel notice for the six countries in Southeast Asia, including Cambodia,” according to the advisory.

Contact author: Niem Chheng

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