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nother wake-up call for Indonesia on the subject of the Zika virus has come from the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which on Thursday advised pregnant women avoid 11 Southeast Asian counties, including Indonesia, where the virus is known to circulate.

The travel advisory is merely part of a standard operating procedure, but with the rainy season soon to arrive, precautionary measures to keep the Zika epidemic at bay should be implemented across the country sooner rather than later.

The rainy season is the time when dengue fever normally breaks out, infecting both the poor and the rich. Zika and dengue have much in common, in particular the way in which the two diseases are transmitted and the symptoms that develop. It is feared that the Zika virus may sneak in unnoticed before eventually wreaking havoc.

Zika spreads through mosquitoes, particularly the infected daytime biting female aedes aegypti, which also causes dengue fever. While Zika may not be as lethal as dengue, the virus can engender microcephaly in babies, a condition characterized by tiny heads and malformed brains.

The latest Zika infection in Indonesia was reported by Eijkman and CDC researchers among dengue patients in Jambi only last year.

Traces of the virus date back almost 40 years earlier to 1977-1978 when a joint research project conducted by the US Namru-2 and Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta found positive infections in 3.2 percent to 7.8 percent of patients suffering from fever.

Later in 1983, another survey discovered that 12.7 percent of patients tested positive for Zika.

In Southeast Asia, Zika was found as early as 1953 in the Philippines and Malaysia. The next year, the virus spread to Thailand, Vietnam and Borneo.

Perhaps Zika is awakening from a long sleep. Although scientists here claim to have isolated the virus and are calling for calm, there is no reason for us to remain complacent now that the disease has become a global concern.

Only recently, Singapore saw a sharp increase in the number of Zika infections. Considering the fact that many Indonesians frequently travel to the neighboring city-state, more steps need to be taken to prevent the disease from spreading here.

First and foremost, health authorities, particularly in the regions, must disseminate information related
to the virus and raise public awareness of the danger of the disease.

Due to their similarities, tips to tackle dengue, like regular fogging to prevent aedes mosquitoes from breeding, might feasibly be applied to fight Zika.

The biggest challenge in the fight against Zika is of course identifying patients, which can be done only through testing. The test is costly for many ordinary people. As such, the health authorities may miss patients infected with the virus.

However, it would be unwise for the government and the people to do nothing but to wait until the virus strikes.