Zika Outbreak, Singapore (5)

The Zika epidemic in Singapore appears to be progressing towards endemicity. As of yesterday, there are 387 confirmed cases, with 9 clusters. Among the confirmed cases are 16 pregnant women, and the Ministry of Health has announced plans to set up a national surveillance programme to monitor the development of babies born to these and […]

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Zika Outbreak, Singapore (4)

Today’s addition of 16 new cases of Zika infection – the smallest number added for the past week – brings the total number of confirmed Zika infections to 258. No links to prior clusters were found in 4 cases. It is too soon to know whether this drop in cases reported represents a blip or if […]

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Zika Outbreak, Singapore (3)

The Ministry of Health Singapore (MOH) released a joint statement last night that included a short statement about the sequencing results of the viruses obtained from two patients from Sim’s Drive. What was of interest was the claim that “the (local) virus belongs to the Asian lineage and likely evolved from the strain that was […]

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Zika Outbreak, Singapore (2)

Following press reports, the Zika epidemic in Singapore has expanded rapidly since it was first reported in the news 6 days ago. There are now 153 cases reported as of yesterday, including two pregnant women. There is also a separate cluster of Zika infections outside of the original Sims Drive/Aljunied Crescent area, at Bedok North Avenue 3. […]

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Zika Outbreak, Singapore

The second case of Zika infection occurred in a woman with no recent history of travel, suggesting that the virus has started to spread locally. Three others living or working near her workplace has also tested positive, according to the Straits Times report. It is important to keep in mind that approximately 80% of Zika […]

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Rio Olympics and Zika

In an open letter to the World Health Organization, 177 (and counting) international scientists and bioethicists –  including one from Singapore – have called for the Olympic and Para-Olympic games to be either postponed or shifted from its current site in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Their concern is that holding the Olympics in Rio as […]

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Zika Infographic

Here is a nice infographic published by the MPH online website. Courtesy of Emily Maynard who helped with its creation. Source: MPHOnline.org

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Zika Article for April SMA News

Wrote a piece on Zika thanks to a kind invitation from the SMA News Editor. Submitted 9th March, published a few days ago, and already largely out of date. We have to accept that this is the speed of information gain today, which in many ways is not a bad thing. It is now widely […]

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Human Parechovirus Infections

The other piece of infectious disease-related news in the Straits Times today was on parechovirus infections. In an (as far as I can tell) unpublished study, follow-up of 80 babies infected with human parechovirus (HPeV) type 3 in Sydney showed that developmental delays had occurred in more than half of them after a year. About a […]

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Zika Virus Infection

Interrupting the febrile neutropenia series to write about Zika virus, which has been in the global news for some months but very recently became a hot topic in the local mainstream news because of the explosive nature of its spread in South America, the new association of this South American strain with microcephaly (in children […]

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