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Zika Virus

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Blood Safety

Abstract

Zika is an RNA virus of the Flaviviridae family, discovered in 1947, in Zika Forest, Uganda. The vectors of Zika virus (ZIKV) transmission are Aedes mosquitoes. The first Zika outbreak in humans occurred in Yap Island, in 2007. A new epidemic occurred in 2013, in French Polynesia, with more than 30,000 cases. An association between Zika infection and Guillain-Barré syndrome was discovered during this outbreak.

In 2015/2016, a major epidemic took place in Brazil, and a neurological complication of Zika’s infection—microcephaly, later called congenital Zika syndrome—was identified in newborns from mothers infected by ZIKV during pregnancy.

From Brazil, the virus spread to other South and Central America countries, later reaching some states in the USA.

The clinical manifestations of Zika include fever, myalgia, headache, conjunctivitis, and arthritis of small joints; only 20% of ZIKV cases present symptoms. Congenital Zika syndrome encompasses an ensemble of severe neurological problems, including microcephaly, subcortical calcifications, and ocular findings, among many others.

ZIKV can be transmitted by means other than mosquitoes: blood transfusion, breast milk, sexual transmission, and possibly saliva and laboratory contamination.

Four probable transfusion-transmitted cases were reported in Brazil. Following those reports, several approaches to minimize Zika transfusion risks are being implemented worldwide, such as blood donors’ travel deferral and deferral due to sexual contact with a person who has been diagnosed with Zika or who has traveled to an area with active transmission, blood component quarantine, interrupting local blood collection, and blood donation’s molecular Zika screening.

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  1. Hemorio Blood Center, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    Luiz Amorim

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  1. Luiz Amorim
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Correspondence to Luiz Amorim .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pathology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA

    Hua Shan

  2. American Red Cross, Medical Office, Rockville, MD, USA

    Roger Y. Dodd

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Amorim, L. (2019). Zika Virus. In: Shan, H., Dodd, R. (eds) Blood Safety . Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94436-4_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94436-4_9

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