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 "There isn't any doubt that Zika causes microcephaly," Dr. Tom
Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC), told reporters in a conference on Wednesday.
U.S. and world health officials have been saying for weeks that
mounting scientific evidence points to the mosquito-borne virus as
the likely cause of the alarming rise in microcephaly in Zika-hit
areas of Brazil. It had not been declared as the definitive cause
until now.
The announcement comes at a critical time for the Obama
Administration, which has been urging the Republican-controlled
Congress to grant nearly $1.9 billion in emergency funds to fight
the virus, which is already affecting Puerto Rico and is expected to
hit parts of the United States with the coming of mosquito-friendly
warmer weather..
In a temporary fix, the White House said last week that it would
redirect $589 million in allocated funds to prepare for Zika's
arrival in the continental United States.
The declaration of Zika as a cause of microcephaly may make it
harder for lawmakers to deny the request for emergency funding.
"I think it's a game-changer," said Dr. Lawrence Gostin, a global
health law expert at Georgetown University who testified before
Congress last month on the need for Zika funding.
"It's acceptable if we don't know for sure if a risk is going to
emerge and we're unprepared, but it's shameful if we absolutely know
that an epidemic is coming and we fail to prepare."
Certainty over whether Zika causes microcephaly should end the
debate in the public health community about the potential impact of
the virus and focus attention on how to prevent infections, experts
said.
"There has been so much debate. It lays that to rest now,"said Dr.
Michael Osterholm, an infectious disease expert at the University of
Minnesota.
In February, the World Health Organization declared Zika a global
health emergency based on its suspected link to thousands of cases
in Brazil of microcephaly, a birth defect marked by small head size
and underdeveloped brains.
The declaration kicked off a flurry of studies to prove a link. The
CDC said its latest conclusions came after all necessary scientific
criteria had been met to make the official call.
"The data are there. The evidence is there. The pieces of
information we have now makes us confident," said Dr. Sonja
Rasmussen, director of the CDC division of public health information
and lead author of a New England Journal of Medicine article
outlining evidence.
CDC now believes microcephaly is just one of a range of serious
birth defects caused by Zika. In Brazil, officials have confirmed
more than 1,100 cases of microcephaly, and considers most of them to
be related to Zika infections in the mothers. It is investigating
more than 3,800 additional suspected cases.
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CDC travel and sexual transmission guidelines remain unchanged.
Women who are pregnant or planning to become pregnant are advised to
avoid travel to the at least 42 countries and territories where Zika
has spread, and men who have been to those areas are advised to
abstain from sex or use condoms with partners who are pregnant or
trying to become pregnant.
There were already signs on Wednesday that Republican lawmakers'
resolve against funding the White House Zika request is weakening.
Senior U.S. House of Representatives Republican Tom Cole said on
Wednesday more funds will be needed to fight the Zika virus in the
United States, signaling a shift from insistence by many Republicans
that the Obama administration should use existing funds for the
effort to combat the growing threat.
"There's going to need to be additional money, I don't think there's
any doubt about that," Cole told reporters after a House Republican
meeting. "We're having discussions about that now."
Republican Senator Marco Rubio, who is from Florida, broke with
other congressional Republicans on Zika last week, announcing his
support for President Barack Obama's nearly $1.9 billion request to
fight the virus.
On Wednesday, Rubio wrote to the CDC to urge it to clear a backlog
of Zika diagnostic tests and prioritize testing for pregnant women,
saying he had seen media reports that some pregnant women have
waited up to a month for CDC to complete their tests.
House Speaker Paul Ryan stood fast, however, saying that if more
money is needed to fight Zika, lawmakers will respond through the
regular appropriations process.
Now that the causal relationship has been established, Frieden said
several important questions must be answered, such as what
percentage of Zika-infected mothers have babies with birth defects.
Researchers also want to discover the full range of brain and
developmental issues that may crop up later in life for infected
babies, Rasmussen said.
(Reporting by Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago, Bill Berkrot in New
York, Susan Cornwell and Timothy Gardner in Washington; Editing by
Bernard Orr)
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