Summary:
Tens of thousands of migrants from Rajasthan visit their hometowns during the Diwali vacation and that many will be visiting the Zika infected regions like Jaipur.The massive movement of people from Gujarat to Rajasthan, according to IARF, during the Diwali vacation is likely to accelerate the current Zika epidemic in India.Zika researcher with IARF, Nitesh Pandey told TOI, “Rajasthan is in the spotlight after the spread of Zika virus. The city has about 4 lakh people from different villages and cities in Rajasthan. Since, Surat has the highest presence of migrants from Marwadi community from Rajasthan, we have issued Zika virus disease infection alert to those travelling to their hometowns this Diwali.”According to Pandey, it is the movement of humans that ensures that constantly new aedes aegypti mosquitoes are infected so that the disease transmission chain continues. However, we have issued precautionary measures to our community members.” We don’t want the people of this city to suffer..