Zika: heterogeneity and historyDear Editors, we read the publication Signifying Zika: Heterogeneity in the Representations of the Virus by History Of Infection with a great interest 1. Guedes et al. 1 concluded that “personal experience seems to shape the social representation of the disease, increasing the focus on its proximate consequences”. There are some issues regarding this report. First, Guedes et al. 1 used interviews to collect data regarding the previous history of having “any disease transmitted by the Aedes aegypti mosquito”. This might not result in accurate data since several acute febrile illness share the same clinical problem and the mis- or underdiagnosis of vector-borne diseases by the Aedes aegypti mosquito might be possible. In addition, the Zika virus disease has a high rate of asymptomatic infection 2, which might not be perceived in the infected cases. In our area, Indochina, previous report showed a high rate of asymptomatic infections among local people and there was no previous concern on having the disease among local people 3. There is a wide clinical spectrum of Zika virus infection 4 and there might be several representations without a specific pattern.
References
- 1 Guedes GR, Coutinho RZ, Marteleto L, Pereira WHS, Duarte D. Signifying Zika: heterogeneity in the representations of the virus by history of infection. Cad Saúde Pública 2018; 34:e00003217.
- 2 Joob B, Yasser F. Phenotypic spectrum of congenital Zika syndrome: a comment on the usefulness of case report. Case Study and Case Report 2017; 7:29-30.
- 3 Kim S, Rajadhan V. Seroprevalence of Zika virus in Cambodia: a preliminary report. Advance Laboratory Medicine International 2016; 6:37-40.
- 4 Wiwanitkit S, Wiwanitkit V. Afebrile, asymptomatic and non-thrombocytopenic Zika virus infection: don't miss it! Asian Pac J Trop Med 2016; 9:513.
