| Airplane passengers walks through feverscan camera system used to detect human temperature shortly after arriving from Singapore at the Soekarno-Hatta airport in Jakarta, Indonesia, August 30, 2016. |
The mosquito-borne Zika virus, which has caused explosive outbreaks in the Americas and the Caribbean since late last year, poses a particular risk to pregnant women because it can cause microcephaly, a severe birth defect in which babies are born with abnormally small heads and underdeveloped brains.
On August 30, the United States warned pregnant women not to travel to Singapore, joining Australia, Taiwan and the Republic of Korea.
The warnings followed news that Zika transmission appears to be occurring outside of the original cluster, with at least five of 26 new cases confirmed late on August 30 detected in the Aljunied area in the southeast of Singapore, the health ministry and National Environment Agency (NEA) said in a joint statement.
Singapore has advised pregnant women to take a free Zika test if they showed any symptoms or if their partners tested positive. “This is regardless of whether they have been to Zika-affected areas,” health officials said in a statement.
The outbreak and advisories come as the tourism industry in one of the world’s busiest travel hubs already faces weak global economic growth. Singapore’s Tourism Board said it was premature to consider any impact on the sector, adding it remained a “safe travel destination”.
More than 55 million people pass through Singapore’s Changi airport every year. In the first half of this year, tourism arrivals topped 8 million, around 1 million more than a year earlier.
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