Chinese scientists have sequenced the genome of the country’s first imported Zika virus and it was helping with prevention and diagnosis.
A memo from the presidency on Wednesday in Beijing said that the success was achieved by scientists with the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention and the provincial centre in East China’s Jiangxi Province.
It noted that China confirmed the first imported Zika case on Feb. 9. when a 34-year-old man from Jiangxi developed fever, headache and dizziness on Jan. 28 in Venezuela before returning home on Feb. 5 via Hong Kong and Shenzhen.
The memo noted that the decoding of the gene sequence from the virus on Monday laid the foundation toward understanding the virus’ variations, as well as developing bacteria and reagents to diagnose the disease.
