Cuba reports first case of Zika transmitted on the island - The Washington Post
▻https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/cuba-reports-first-case-of-zika-transmitted-on-the-island/2016/03/15/123327b2-eb1d-11e5-a9ce-681055c7a05f_story.html
Cuban officials announced Tuesday night that they have detected the first case of the Zika virus transmitted inside the country, ending Cuba’s status as one of the last nations in the hemisphere without domestic cases of the disease that has been linked to birth defects.
Fumigation fog fills the Vedado neighborhood after soldiers sprayed to kill mosquitos in Havana, Cuba, Tuesday, March 15, 2016. Authorities are fumigating in an attempt to prevent the spread of zika, chikungunya and dengue, after the World Health Organization declared Zika to be a global emergency last month.
Desmond Boylan/Associated Press
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Cuba has thrown more than 9,000 soldiers, police and university students into an effort to fumigate for mosquitoes, wipe out the standing water where they breed and prevent a Zika epidemic.
President Raul Castro has called on the nation to battle lax fumigation and trash collection, turning the Zika fight into a test of the communist government’s once-legendary ability to marshal the entire country behind efforts ranging from civil defense to bigger sugar harvests to disease prevention.
In recent days the streets of Havana have been crisscrossed by teams of green-clad soldiers fumigating houses with mosquito-killing fog. Residents of the capital say fumigators no longer accept excuses of allergies or requests to spray some other day, as frequently happened in the past.