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Everything you need to know about the zika virus in South Florida.

Is It Zika Or Dengue? New CDC Guidance Advises Doctors To Test Patients For Both.

Felipe Dana
/
AP
Aedes aegypti mosquitoes can transmit Zika and dengue fever. The CDC advises doctors to test patients for both because of similarities in symptoms and geographic prevalence of both diseases.

Summer in South Florida brings warm weather, high humidity and mosquitoes — an ideal environment for two closely related viruses, Zika and dengue fever.

Scientists with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday that they want clinicians to keep both diseases in mind whenever patients present with fever, rash, and joint and muscle pain.

Zika and dengue fever have surfaced in South Florida in the past. Both are transmitted primarily by the bite of an infected Aedes aegypti mosquito, though Zika can also be transmitted by sex and through blood transfusions. And both produce similar symptoms.

Read more at our news partner the Miami Herald.

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