Jamaican Health Minister Horace Dalley has announced that the Ministry will be hiring and training one thousand young people as vector control workers.
They will go into communities, and along with the Ministry’s vector control teams, identify and destroy mosquito breeding sites. Mr. Dalley has also charged senior officials in the Ministry to prepare the public in the event the Zika virus is detected in Jamaica.
The Health Minister announced these initiatives at a National Training Seminar to prepare the health sector for the Zika virus, which is spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito.
“We want to have every single hand on deck to protect our population. We are going to do everything, community by community, parish by parish to ensure that we try our very best to eliminate the mosquito, to identify the virus if it comes and make sure that we do our part to minimise the impact on our population, our economy and our people,” the Minister emphasized.
Zika symptoms include severe fever, joint and muscle pains, headaches, rashes and conjunctivitis. The symptoms appear within three to 12 days following a bite.
