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CDC Director: Just A Few Weeks' Of Zika Funding Remain

Leon County Judge John Cooper on June 30, 2022, in a screen grab from The Florida Channel.
CDC
/
The Florida Channel
Leon County Judge John Cooper on June 30, 2022, in a screen grab from The Florida Channel.

The head of the government's fight against the Zika virus says that "we are now essentially out of money" and warns that the country is "about to see a bunch of kids born with microcephaly" in the coming months.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Thomas Frieden addressed a handful of reporters as lawmakers start to sort out a stopgap government funding bill that is being targeted to also carry long-delayed money to battle Zika.

Zika is spreading more widely in the U.S. and can not only cause microcephaly - in which babies are born with grave brain defects - but other problems that the country will face for decades.

Frieden said funding delays have slowed long-term studies of the disease and production of new tests for it.