A warning was issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to pregnant women travelling to Miami on the Zika virus. The Florida Governor, Rick Scott also issued a message to pregnant women to contact their Gynecologist to obtain Zika prevention kit. In the month of June soon after the argument on the blocked federal funds for Zika prevention, the Republican governor set aside $26 million from the state funds to procure CDC Zika prevention kits which includes a mosquito repellents, tablets to kill mosquitoes infested in the water and condoms.
Scott informed that the governor’s office and the state department of health are working in coordination to educate people in the concern area. The zika prevention kits were also distributed to pregnant women through OB-GYNs. But it is still not clear how far the kits have reached. Meanwhile, the spokesperson from the Florida Department of Health in an email said that prevention kits are available at the offices of OB-GYNs but was not clear on how they were distributed. While speaking to the Planned Parenthood vice president of South East and North florida, she said that they did not receive any such kit from the department of health. She also added that there was no guidance from the state department on the severity of the outbreak.
The complaint is that the state has taken on Zika and has blocked the state funding for reproductive health clinics when most of the pregnancies are unforeseen. Reports say that the recent Zika cases are not the first in the state. By the end of July around 400 cases were reported and within a span of many months, 55 pregnant women were involved. These cases were travel oriented and this goes to prove that it was brought home from outside of the United States. Now the department of Health is testing pregnant women free of cost for Zika symptoms and the virus is contained informs Jeri Bustamante, Spokesperson of the Governor
