As warm, mosquito-friendly weather approaches, the risk of Zika virus outbreaks for U.S. cities increases. Some, like Houston, are at more risk than others.
In a recent piece from NPR, Houston's vulnerability to Zika and some of the city's strategies to mitigate that vulnerability are examined. The reasons Houston is at particular risk of an outbreak are three-fold, according to Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, who spoke with NPR.
Here are the three reasons Houston is at risk and some strategies being implemented to help bolster prevention.
1. Gateway city: Houston is an immigration hub equipped with an international airport. Thousands of people traverse through the city every day. It is likely that some of those travelers are carrying Zika. Federal health officials are reportedly keeping watch at Houston's international airport to ensure that travelers with Zika are identified and treated.
2. Friendly environment: The Aedes aegypti mosquito that carries Zika proliferates throughout Houston in the summertime. City, county and state officials pledged to clean up trash where water can pool and mosquitoes can breed by the thousands.
3. Economics: "I think one of the missing narratives that we've not heard about Zika is that this is a disease of poverty," Dr. Hotez told NPR. Houston, like many other major American cities, has a high concentration of poverty. In poor neighborhoods, trash accumulation tends to be more of an issue. Also, many homes in the poorer communities of Houston lack screen windows and air-conditioning. Along with the commitment of officials to assist in trash removal, Houston residents, according to the NPR piece, will need to participate in debris cleanup and seek medical attention if they believe to have been exposed to the virus. Dr. Hotez hopes these efforts will minimize Zika's impact on the community.
More articles on the Zika virus:
Can Zika infiltrate US blood supply? 5 things to know
Quirky pest: 6 things to know about the difficult fight against the Zika-spreading mosquito
Zika, HPV, flu: 5 recent stories on vaccines