India has sent experts to try to contain an outbreak of the Zika virus in the popular tourist destination of Jaipur, capital of the northern state of Rajasthan, with a close watch on pregnant women.
Twenty-two people in the city have tested positive, the health ministry said.
There is no vaccine to the virus, which can cause severe birth defects in unborn children.
Pregnant women in the area are being monitored by the National Health Mission, a body set up by the government to improve healthcare across the country.
“The situation continues to be monitored regularly,” the ministry said in a statement late on Monday.
The Toronto-based International Association for Medical Assistance to Travellers said that it was advising pregnant travelers to postpone trips to the area, part of India’s tourist “golden triangle” of Delhi, Jaipur and Agra, and home to the Taj Mahal.
First discovered in 1947, the Zika virus reached epidemic proportions in Brazil in 2015, when thousands of babies were born with microcephaly, a brain defect affecting speech and motor function.
It is the third such outbreak in India, with the first in the western city of Ahmedabad in January last year and the second in the southern state of Tamil Nadu in July last year.
Both outbreaks were “successfully contained,” the government said.
The latest cases — in the middle of the country’s festival season when many Indians travel, increasing the risk of transmission — come amid a spike in other mosquito-borne diseases, that kill thousands across India each year, the WHO said.
The capital, New Delhi, has reported a rise in cases of dengue fever, with 169 reported in the first week of October and taking the total for the year to 650, the NDTV news channel reported, citing figures from the South Delhi Municipal Corp that tracks mosquito-borne diseases.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese