Women in 46 countries across Latin America and the Caribbean should consider delaying pregnancy due to the Zika virus, the World Health Organization said in new guidance issued this week.
The guidance affects millions of people living in countries where Zika is being spread, causing severe birth defects in some infants whose mothers were infected with the virus.
Because Zika can be so harmful to a fetus, and because there is increasing evidence that the virus can be transmitted sexually, the WHO now says men and women of reproductive age should be “correctly informed and oriented to consider delaying pregnancy.”
In the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has declined to advise women against getting pregnant, saying that’s a decision best left up to women and their doctors. But the agency has warned women who are pregnant or considering becoming pregnant against traveling to countries with Zika.
There’s no vaccine currently available for Zika, although the CDC is working to develop one. Several hundred people in the continental U.S. have been found to have the virus, although all of them contracted it through travel or contact with a traveler. Puerto Rico is the only part of the U.S. where Zika is being transmitted through mosquito bites.
