Clara DeMagalhaes                                                                                                        Current Event 18

Baumgaertner, Emily. “A Virus Even More Dangerous Than Zika to Pregnant Women.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 7 Jan. 2019, www.nytimes.com/2019/01/07/health/rift-valley-pregnancy-zika.html.

In a study testing how the virus that causes Rift Valley fever targets the human placenta, researchers found that the virus could potentially be even more dangerous to fetuses than the Zika virus, an already very dreadful disease. The research showed that 65% of rats born to infected mothers died in contrast to the mortality rate of pups from healthy parents being 25%. Pregnant rats were more likely to die from the fever too. Though the virus normally occurs in African livestock, humans are also affected. In 2000, 100,000 people in Saudi Arabia were infected by this and about 700 ended up dead. There is no known cure and the mosquito that transfers it also lives in Europe and the Americas. The virus specifically targets a layer of cells that support the region of the placenta where nutrients flow in, making it one of the few microbes that can bypass the protection of the fetus.

As the Zika virus is already dangerous enough, hearing about the fact that there is an even deadlier alternative on the loose is bad news. The way that the virus infects the placentas of mothers is something that is new to researchers which makes finding a cure even more difficult. Although Rift Valley fever vaccines are being developed, there’s no guarantee that the virus will not spread beyond the Middle East, which is where it is local. Amy Hartman, an infectious disease specialist, states that, “ Climate change can alter how emerging infectious diseases will spread. As mosquito populations move and change, we have a potential for this to spread far beyond its normal boundaries”.

The article was very good at keeping things compact while still supplying all the needed information. The data is also quite credible due to the excess amount of quotes and accounts that came from researchers. However, one thing that could use improvement is the order that the information was presented. I feel like the article would have flowed better if everything about the studies conducted on rats was talked about first rather than scattering that throughout the piece. This eliminates the possibility of any confusion happening and make things neater overall.