For the study, researchers with the University of Utah Health Care in Salt Lake City — one of three hospitals named to the U.S. Olympic Committee’s National Medical Network — tested 457 blood samples from Olympic athletes and staff after they returned from Brazil. Thirty-two of the individuals tested positive for mosquito-borne viruses, with 27 testing positive for West Nile. Additionally, three tested positive for Chikungunya, and two tested positive for Dengue. None tested positive for Zika.
“Everyone was concentrating on Zika and ignoring that there could be other infections caused by mosquito bites,” said Dr. Krow Ampofo, an infectious disease specialist with UUHC and the study’s presenter. “We did not expect to find so many with these other infections. That is one of the reasons why we think that being vigilant about monitoring for infectious diseases after travel to at-risk areas is so important.”
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