The dengue fever has reportedly hit the Miami area, where health officials announced the first non-travel case this year of the illness, which is spread by the same mosquitoes linked to the Zika virus.
Dengue fever is a viral disease that is spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, ABC News noted. The illness can cause flu-like symptoms including fever, rash, and aches and pains, and can even become deadly in rare cases.
According to the Florida Health Department, this is the second dengue fever case to be reported in Miami this year, with the other case found in Key West in June. Key West also dealt with an outbreak of the fever in 2009, which lasted until 2010, ABC News noted.
Since July, the locally transmitted Zika virus has infected about 115 people, and health officials have been working hard to abate the population of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes to reduce the spread of Zika in Florida, ABC News noted.
Miami-Dade Mosquito Control is conducting aggressive mosquito control practices to attenuate the possibility of a dengue fever virus spread as well.
The individual infected in Miami-Dade is expected to make a full recovery, The Daily Beast reported.
The DOH is also investigating those near the patient to determine whether others also were infected — not through direct contact, but by mosquito bites.
“It’s not unexpected in the light of dengue being transmitted elsewhere by the same vector in the same areas,” Joseph Conlon, a technical adviser for the American Mosquito Control Association, told The Daily Beast. “This underscores the importance of keeping our eye on vector control — not Zika control.”
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