The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday that the lack of new funding from Congress is making it harder to fight the Zika virus.
“We know there are many things we cannot do without supplemental appropriations,” CDC Director Tom Frieden during a briefing before Florida lawmakers on Wednesday.
Florida is among the states that could be hit hard by the virus, experts have said. Frieden also warned that, “mosquito season is heating up, Zika is heating up.”
So far, the Zika virus isn’t spread via mosquito bites, the primary mode of transmission, in the continental United States. However, Frieden said it is possible that doctors may not be aware of the virus being spread via mosquitoes.
“We already had a dengue case earlier this year in Florida,” Frieden said, referring to another virus spread via mosquito bites.
Currently there are more than 700 cases in the U.S. of Zika, but almost all are from people who traveled to a country or territory where the virus is spreading via mosquitoes.
Both the House and Senate are trying to reconcile differences in spending packages to fight Zika. The House approved $622 million in funding offset from other programs and the Senate $1.1 billion in new funding.
