Health authorities previously downplayed the risk of the Zika virus to women in the United States, but experts are now predicting that mosquitoes carrying the disease will likely touch down in the southern region of the United States in the coming months.
Texas and Florida are the states facing the greatest risk, because of the climates in parts of both states, as well as their large populations.
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"We're extremely concerned that health centers, because of the housing and conditions around the housing that our patients live in, are going to start seeing quite a few of the Zika patients," Jose Camacho, executive director and general counsel for the Texas Association of Community Health Centers, told Kaiser Health News.
As is the case with many public health crises, Camacho predicted that the "poorest of the poor" would be disproportionately affected. Public health officials in both Texas and Florida are thus gearing up for a campaign to educate people on how to avoid the virus and, more importantly, how to avoid transmitting it to an infant.
While Zika can in some instances cause severe problems for adult carriers, it generally passes without long-term damage. The disease is usually only a problem for pregnant women, as infected babies are often afflicted with severe birth defects.
"The ways to prevent it are to either, one, not be pregnant and, number two, if someone is pregnant, avoid exposure — which I think can be more challenging," says Anthony Ogburn, chairman of the department of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley School of Medicine in Harlingen.
Much of the educational campaign will focus on women of childbearing age, telling them to avoid standing water or other places where they can expect to encounter mosquitoes.
Republican governors in Florida and Texas opted not to have their states participate in the federally funded Medicaid expansion that was offered as part of the Affordable Care Act. The Lone Star State has the highest uninsured rate in the country, with more than 20 percent of its population lacking health coverage. That figure likely does not account for the state's undocumented population.
Lack of or unaffordable coverage is likely to be one of the barriers to spreading awareness about Zika prevention, say health advocates.
"Are the proper things being funded that help at the local level? I'd have to say no," says Camacho. "And the communities our patients reside in are usually the last ones to get the attention."
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