After great audience success, the first symposium on Zika virus in the world is to be repeated during the 2016 MEDTROP

One of the themes with greater impact was the presentation of the preliminary results that confirmed Zika virus can easily be spread by Culex mosquitoes

The expectations for the 2016 MEDTROP increased after the discussions of A, B, C, D and E workshops involving Zika virus, held in Recife in March. This is due to the fact that the event in Pernambuco, the first scientific event about the virus in the world, should be replicated during the 52nd Congress of the Brazilian Society of Tropical Medicine (MEDTROP) .

The A, B, C, D and E workshops on Zika virus gathered in March 1st and 2nd, researchers from several Brazilian and foreign institutions, who exchanged valuable information of clinical and epidemiological aspects, diagnostic, and Zika virus biology, besides vectors and other arbovirus diseases.

The chair of the workshop and director at the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz) in Pernambuco, BSTM vice-president Doctor Sinval Brandão Filho, classified the event as historical. Besides the large audience, with over 600 people in the two days and 4,424 online accesses from 26 countries, Dr. Sinval highlighted the high quality of the presentations, from both Brazilians and foreigners.

The presentations high quality provided a super important debate on the perspectives of knowledge advance around Zika virus in several fields of study, he explained.

He stressed that he recommended that great part of the symposiums schedule should be replicated in the 2016 MEDTROP, which should emphasize the debates involving Zika virus. The developments could take place in the events schedule as through a satellite symposium.

Medtrop 2016 will take place from August 21 to 24 in Maceió, Alagoas.

Zika virus in mosquitos saliva

One of the themes approached in the workshop and that had great repercussion, especially by the press, was the presentation of preliminary results confirming Zika virus can easily be spread by laboratory-infected Culex quinquefaciatus, commonly known as black-winged stilts or southern house mosquito. The research was conducted by Constância Ayres, from the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz) in Pernambuco.

The preliminary investigations showed the virus dispersion to the insects salivary gland, from where the diseases transmission to humans would happen. The experiment involved 200 C. quinquefaciatus and 200 Aedes aegypti specimens. The results showed Zika is fully capable of surviving in the common southern house mosquitos organism.

The researcher believes Zika transmission can also involve other mosquito species, since the virus is highly adaptable. Still according to her, the theme should be carefully examined and the control strategies should be addressed towards all potential vectors. In an article published in the Lancet Infectious Diseases, Constância says believing A. aegypti is the main vector in areas where other mosquito species co-exist is naïve.

The researchs results, however, are still partial and should only be conclusive within six to eight months.

According to Doctor Sinval, more experiments of experimental infection in mammals and the findings of natural mosquito infection in the field. However, this is a very consistent evidence that other vectors can also be playing a role in the virus transmission, he said.

Besides this research, Doctor Sinval stressed the importance of all other works presented in the workshop. Among them, the reports of the natural history of the disease in Pernambuco and other places in the Northeast and Southeast regions in Brazil and Colombia, besides ongoing epidemiological studies and about the virus isolation and diagnostic, vaccine perspectives, vector control and international cooperation.…