[blueplum]

I’m no expert either, but I wonder about things when I read articles that say the mosquito itself is here, and migrating thru SoCal like wildfire it seems, although we’ve had a pretty dry winter with cold nights. And I wonder how so many mosquitos of a particular species could fly all the way from Brazil to California in such a short period of time, without wiping out the populations of all the countries inbetween. How did the USA get to be so special so quickly? Or does someone just not want Britons fleeing to the USA?

[this_ol_patriot]

The mosquitoes are already here, very common varieties in the south, after they “bite” an infected person then they act as vectors, it's not the bugs that moved it's the infected people.

[gleeaikin]

To catch Zika you either have to be bitten by an infected mosquito or have unprotected sex with an infected human. The mosquitoes that can become infected by Zika are already here in significant numbers. All they have to do is bite an infected human and then spread it among the mosquito population. At this point it is probably easier to protect mosquitoes from infected humans than to kill all mosquitoes that could potentially be infected. Therefore don’t visit countries where Zika is common, if you do, wear repellent at all times, and wear it when you come home for several months and use protection when you have sex. Zika can infect the Aedes aegypti mosquito, Aedes albopictus, and the Asian Tiger Mosquito. Here is a scary link with the 2016 map of range of these mosquitoes in the US which is much greater than previously recognized. The eastern half of the US is pretty much covered.

http://www.cdc.gov/zika/vector/range.html

Simplest way to reduce mosquitoes is to empty all standing water containers at least twice weekly. This includes the saucers under plant pots. Remove old tires, empty and recycle cans, etc. Breading sterile mosquitoes as was done in the screw worm situation seems worth a try. More research is needed on whether there may be other factors that increase the microcephaly rate, like malnutrition, pesticide or agricultural poisons, etc. Personally if I were pregnant, I would want a high nutrition and supplement diet including extra vitamin C 4 times a day. Also significant is choline which is essential in brain formation. See details below. Reading this article I doubt the poor women of NE Brazil had much choline in their diets.

http://www.berkeleywellness.com/supplements/vitamins/article/should-you-boost-your-choline