Sexually transmitted Zika case confirmed in Texas

World Today

An Aedes aegypti mosquito is photographed through a microscope at the Fiocruz institute in Recife, Pernambuco state, Brazil, Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2016. The mosquito is a vector for the proliferation of the Zika virus currently spreading throughout Latin America. New figures from Brazil’s Health Ministry show that the Zika virus outbreak has not caused as many confirmed cases of a rare brain defect as first feared. (AP Photo/Felipe Dana)

Health officials say a patient in Texas has acquired the Zika virus through sexual transmission.

Dallas County Health and Human Services said Tuesday it received confirmation from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The patient was infected after having sexual contact with an ill person who returned from a country where Zika was present.

The Zika virus is usually spread through mosquito bites. Investigators have been exploring the possibility the virus also can be spread through sex. It was found in one man’s semen in Tahiti, and there was report of a Colorado researcher who caught the virus overseas and apparently spread it to his wife back home in 2008.

Health officials note there are no reports of Zika being transmitted by mosquitoes in Dallas County.

Story by The Associated Press.