Here’s news for South Floridians who travel frequently to countries where Zika is endemic: A blood screening for the virus now is available through a well-known private company instead of exclusively through public health officials.
Federal regulators have given emergency authorization for the use of the first commercial Zika virus test, easing concerns about screening shortages and result delays as summer mosquito season looms.
Quest Diagnostics began offering the first commercial Zika test in the United States this month at its more than two dozen South Florida patient service centers. Specimens are sent to a Quest laboratory in California, said company spokeswoman Wendy Bost, with results expected to be ready in three to five days.
“We at Quest feel our role in the Zika outbreak is to provide a complement to the public health response,” Bost said. “Quality testing can get patients into treatment, where they can make informed decisions.”
The test still requires a doctor’s prescription. In most cases, except for pregnant women, physicians order the screening only for patients who recently have traveled to Zika-outbreak areas and are showing symptoms.
Florida has one-fourth of the nation’s reported Zika cases, or 122 as of Wednesday, more than any other state. Quest representatives are in Florida and other states speaking with physicians and hospitals about the new service, Bost said.
Previously, Zika tests in Florida were available only through the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and handled by two of the state’s three public health laboratories, initially creating concerns about test availability and possible backlogs.
So far, there have been no testing or processing delays through the public health departments, said Mara Gambineri, spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Health. Florida has enough tests to screen 6,358 people for the active virus and 1,999 for Zika antibodies, showing they were exposed to the virus, Gambineri said.
In total, state public health officials have tested 1,262 people for Zika, she said.
The new Quest Zika Virus RNA Qualitative Real-Time RT-PCR screening, developed by Quest subsidiary Focus Diagnostics Inc., is a molecular test that can detect RNA from the Zika virus in human blood serum, Bost said. It’s best administered within a week of symptom onset.
Quest is working on a Zika antibody test, she said. These tests sometimes are preferred because they can detect the presence of the virus over a longer span of time.
The blood test is $500 and, in most cases, covered by insurance, Bost said. Quest is offering a discounted $120 test for patients whose health care providers have verified they are uninsured and need testing.
The FDA’s temporary authorization of Quest’s Zika test — which expires after a year — will make testing more accessible as the number of Zika cases rises, said Dr. Marie Florent-Carre, director of the Department of Rural and Urban Underserved Medicine at Nova Southeastern University.
“People are concerned about Zika. There’s been some anxiety among the general public,” said Florent-Carre.
The virus isn’t fatal and its symptoms are milder than similar infections spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquito, such as dengue fever. Zika fears have been heightened, however, by its link to babies being born with microcephaly, or abnormally small heads, which can lead to impaired brain development.
Researchers also continue exploring whether Zika can attack the nervous system and is connected with Guillain-Barre, a rare neurological syndrome that can leave patients unable to walk or in chronic pain.
Anyone who has recently traveled to a country with a Zika outbreak and has two or more symptoms of the mosquito-borne virus should see their doctor and ask about testing, Florent-Carre said. The CDC has posted travel alerts for almost 50 countries, most in the Carribbean, Central and South America.
The four most common Zika symptoms are: fever, rash, joint pain and conjunctivitis (red eyes). However, about three-fourths of those infected with Zika never show symptoms.
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