The tiny Central American country of El Salvador has advised women in the country to avoid getting pregnant till 2018 because of the danger posed by the mosquito-borne Zika virus.
Pregnant women are also advised to completely cover themselves when outdoors so as to prevent getting bit by mosquitoes.
The Zika virus is a disease that causes microcephaly, an abnormal smallness of a baby’s head at birth which is linked to incomplete brain development.
This defect can impair the baby’s intellectual capacity and physical development, and sometimes even cause death.
The virus is spread by bites from the Aedes species mosquitoes, which has been plaguing other American countries including Colombia and Brazil.
“We’d like to suggest to all the women of fertile age that they take steps to plan their pregnancies, and avoid getting pregnant between this year and next,” Eduardo Espinoza, the country’s vice-minister of public health was quoted as saying by Al Jazeera.
The report also quoted Espinoza as saying that the advice became necessary after 5,397 cases of the virus were detected in the country in 2015 and the first few days of 2016.
However, of the 96 women officially suspected have contracted the virus, none of them has so far had a baby with an abnormally small head.