RIO DE JANEIRO: Brazilian scientists are testing the effectiveness of a plant-source medicine against the Zika virus, which is thought to be responsible for the large increase in the number of microcephaly cases in newborns, reports China’s Xinhua news agency.

Rio de Janeiro’s regional government said on Wednesday that the natural medicine was developed by researchers from the state-run Vital Brazil Institute and has effectively inhibited some viruses, like yellow fever and dengue type two virus, from replicating in the experimental stage.

New tests will attempt to establish whether the natural medicine is also able to combat dengue type one, three and four, Zika and chikungunya.

“We are very confident that we will have news soon. We have the possibility of presenting positive results when it comes to treating these diseases, including attending to the pregnant women who have contracted the viruses,” the institute’s president Edmilson Migowski said.

Zika, like dengue and chikungunya, is spread by the Aedes Aegypti mosquito and is considered to be responsible for the large increase in the microcephaly cases in newborns.

According to the Health Ministry’s latest bulletin, Zika has spread to all of Brazil’s 27 states, mainly affecting the northeastern states.

The Brazilian government decreed a state of emergency in November 2015 and has dispatched servicemen and women to search for and eliminate the Aedes aegypti mosquito’s possible breeding grounds. — Bernama