The patient lives in Cameron County in the Rio Grande Valley and was confirmed last week by a lab test to be infected. She is not pregnant and reported no recent travel to Mexico or anywhere else with ongoing Zika virus transmission and no other risk factors.

“This is not surprising. We knew this would happen eventually because Texas is so close to Mexico,” said Mary Suzanne Whitworth, M.D., medical director of Infectious Diseases at Cook Children’s. “Mosquitoes don’t have borders. The good news is at this time of the year, we should get our first freeze soon and the mosquitoes in the Fort Worth/Dallas area should die out for the winter."

For more information:

• Texas Announces Local Zika Virus Case in Rio Grande Valley
• The deets on DEET from a pediatrician
• Should we be afraid of Zika?
• 11 facts about the Zika virus

About the source

Mary Suzanne Whitworth, M.D. is the medical director of Infectious Diseases at Cook Children’s, which offers care for children and teens with diseases caused by bacteria, parasites, fungi or viruses. Our team provides a broad range of services including diagnosis, inpatient and outpatient consultations, immune deficiency evaluations and treatment of recurring infections.