By Ministério da Defesa - Solenidade de passagem de cargo dos Comandantes da 2ª Região Militar e da 2ª Divisão de Exército no QG do Comando Militar do Sudeste (CMSE), CC BY 2.0 Rio de Janeiro, Feb 13 (EFE).- Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff led this Saturday the National Day of Mobilization for the Fight against the Aedes Aegypti, a day during which more than 200,000 members of the armed for...

Dental Park at Flikier Institute in Costa Rica The healthiest sets of teeth that dentists in Costa Rica can ever hope to examine are usually hidden deep in the gum tissue of newborn babies. These tiny pearls are not visible until they start to break through the tissue, which is something that starts to happen at the sixth month of life. Primary teeth are visible by the age of three, which i...

Microcephaly is a birth defect which causes babies to be born with unusually small heads and brains. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters) WASHINGTON DC and SAN JOSE, COSTA RICA - The Pan American Health Organization says Latin America will have between 2 million and 3 million Zika cases, warning that the 100,000 cases reported thus far do not reflect the magnitude of the situation because many ...

Wikimedia Commons Alison Kosik, a business correspondent for CNN based in New York, enjoyed a vacation in Costa Rica in late January. Just one day after her return to the United States, she noticed that she had endured various mosquito bites at the beach, and she also started feeling headaches, sweats and chills. In an interesting report published on CNN.com, Ms. Kosik recounts her odyssey ...

Zika map. Source: CDC The full case of a 55-year old tourist from the United States, who contracted the Zika virus in Costa Rica, has been published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, a medical journal established in 1927 by the American College of Physicians. The author of the article is Dr. Lin H. Chen of the Mount Auburn Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Massachusetts. Mount Auburn...

Wikimedia Commons Dover – The Delaware Division of Public Health (DPH) announced today the state’s first Zika case in an adult female. The illness was travel-related and pregnancy is not an issue. Zika is primarily spread by mosquito bite and the individual is not considered infectious. The illness was mild, as expected, and was confirmed by a CDC blood test. To protect privacy, DPH will not b...

By Mar Centenera Buenos Aires, Feb 8 (EFE).- The Aedes aegypti mosquito is considered "a perfect virus-spreading machine" by scientists at Argentina's Center for Plagues and Insecticides Research, or Cipein, which studies the insect's preferences and phobias to fight it and contain dengue, Zika and Chikunguña epidemics. Females of the species, able to lay an average of 100 to 300 eggs, bite ...

Zika is spread by the Aedes aegyptie mosquito (Wikimedia Commons) Costa Rica’s Ministry of Health on Tuesday sent a formal request to the World Health Organization (WHO) asking to be removed from the list of nations with active, indigenous transmission of the Zika virus. Minister of Health, Fernando Llorca said that in the view of Costa Rican health officials, there is no evidence that the ...

(Archive / Stock) As the result of the over-exploitation of aquifers throughout the northwestern province of Guanacaste, thousands of people are receiving water that has been salinized to the point it is no longer fit for human consumption, Elizabeth Fallas, one of the officials that oversees community water systems known as ASADAs for the Costa Rican Institute of Aqueducts and Sewers (AyA), t...

Zika is spread by the Aedes aegyptie mosquito (Wikimedia Commons) TEGUCIGALPA (EFE) Honduran health authorities reported Tuesday that they have registered 35 cases of the nerve disorder known as Guillain-Barre syndrome linked to the Zika virus. "At this time, we have 35 cases of Guillain-Barre, of which one adult and one little boy are on artificial respirators," Deputy Health Minister Fran...

Olympic mascots are seen at the Sambadrome in Rio de Janeiro's Sambadrome, Feb. 7, 2016. (Reuters OMX) NEW YORK (Reuters OMX) The United States Olympic Committee told U.S. sports federations that athletes and staff concerned for their health over the Zika virus should consider not going to the Rio 2016 Olympic Games in August. The message was delivered in a conference call involving USOC of...

Press Advantage - The Costa Rica School of Massage Therapy has announced the presence of the Costa Rica School of Yoga on their Playa Samara campus. With this addition students will be able to take part in yoga teacher training. Those who sign up now will be able to enjoy a free week of teacher training in Nicoya. "We have focused on various elements of fitness for some time now and are so happ...

Zika is spread by the Aedes aegyptie mosquito (Wikimedia Commons) Costa Rica’s Minister of Health, Dr. Fernando Llorca and Security Minister Gustavo Mata announced plans for a massive mobilization of some 14,000 workers from the Ministry of Public Security (MSP) to be deployed alongside workers from the Ministry of Health to fumigate and eliminate breeding grounds of the Aedes aegypti mosquito...

Source: Pixabay Commons Concerns about the fast spread of the Zika virus in the Americas are keeping public health officials on their toes, and discussion about the often uncomfortable topic of sexual tourism is emerging as a sort of side effect. As recently reported by The Costa Rica Star, the first endemic case of the Zika virus in our country appears to have been contracted by a tourist ...

Wikimedia Commons Many dental tourists who choose to get treatments in Costa Rica are often interested in implantation procedures. Dental implants are prosthetic devices used to replace missing teeth; essentially, a dental implant is an artificial tooth that is permanently affixed to maxillary tissue by means of a root.   Dental implants are very popular among dental tourists, but t...

Wikimedia Commons Rio de Janeiro, Feb 5 (EFE).- Mayor Eduardo Paes took the opportunity of Friday's ceremony marking the state of Rio's famous Carnival to urge residents of Brazil's second city not to forget the fight against the mosquito that transmits the Zika virus and dengue fever. "Don't forget the mosquito, which now brings us a new disease, Zika," he said. The spread of Zika and i...

Dr. Mario Bonilla of New Smile Dental Group Oral restoration is the most popular procedure attracting dental tourists to Costa Rica, particularly when it comes from a desire to replace missing teeth. Although many dental tourists are driven by aesthetic motivations, this is not their sole impulse; according to the dental professionals at the New Smile Dental Group of Costa Rica, not all of the...

Microcephaly is a birth defect which causes babies to be born with unusually small heads and brains. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters) By Carol Pearson (VOA) The Zika virus rarely causes problems for the people who get it. Eighty percent don't show any symptoms, others might have a rash or a slight fever. The disease seems insignificant, but it also seems to be having a devastating eff...

Zika is spread by the Aedes aegyptie mosquito (Wikimedia Commons) MONTEVIDEO (EFE) Costa Rica's Minister of Health, Fernando Llorca and health ministers of 14 Latin American countries agreed in Montevideo, Uruguay Wednesday on a roadmap to fight the Zika virus, linked in Brazil to a dramatic increase of birth defects. After meeting all day in the Uruguayan capital, the ministers approved a ...

Cristina Vargas claims Dr. Vargas Scott severely deformed her buttocks after injecting her with a toxic substance known as PMMA. (ICR / CRS Archive) Several years after charges were initially filed, a Costa Rican doctor is set to face trial in the case of a botched cosmetic procedure that left a former Costa Rican model’s buttocks severely deformed. The Criminal Court of Pavas decided on Ja...

Microcephaly, a birth defect which causes babies to be born with unusually small heads and brains, is linked to the Zika virus. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters) (VOA) A county in the southwestern state of Texas reported what appears to be the first case of the Zika virus being transmitted in the United States by sexual contact. Officials in Dallas County said Tuesday the patient was infe...

Wikimedia Commons Although it may seem as if Costa Rica has always been the leading nation for dental tourism in the Americas, many of us tend to forget that Venezuela once held the title as one of the best Latin American nations for medical and dental tourism, at least until the late 1980s.   There are good reasons to believe that Venezuela could still be the medical and dental tou...

Microcephaly, a birth defect which causes babies to be born with unusually small heads and brains, is linked to the Zika virus. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters) The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday added Costa Rica and Nicaragua to a growing list of places where travelers risk being infected with Zika, a rapidly spreading mosquito-borne virus. The addition of Cos...

Zika is spread by the Aedes aegyptie mosquito (Wikimedia Commons) A tourist from the United States fell ill with the Zika virus after visiting Costa Rica, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Costa Rican health officials, who are investigating what could be the first case of indigenous transmission of the virus in the country.  The announcement was made by the Minister o...

Denver, Feb 1 (EFE).- The legalization and sale of marijuana in Colorado since 2014 has reduced the operations of Mexican drug cartels both along the southern U.S. border as well as inside this country, according to a report released Monday by a group specializing in legal matters. The report, published by Lawyer Herald, uses recent statistics from several sources to conclude that the legal pro...

Wikimedia Commons Geneva, Feb 1 (EFE).- The World Health Organization said Monday that the dramatic increase in Brazil of birth defects thought to be caused by the mosquito-borne Zika virus constitutes an international public health emergency. The sharp rise in babies born with abnormally small skulls - a condition known as microcephaly - in areas suffering from a Zika outbreak "constitute ...

Microcephaly, a birth defect which causes babies to be born with unusually small heads and brains, is linked to the Zika virus. (Photo by Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters) Costa Rica’s Ministry of Health is planning to use bacteria in the fight against the Aedes aegypti mosquito, which spreads Zika virus, dengue, and chikungunya, amongst other viruses and diseases.   The bacterium, known as...

A slide on the Zika cases distribution around the world is pictured during an information session for Members States at the World Health Organization Executive Board meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, January 28, 2016. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse GENEVA (Reuters) - Independent experts to the World Health Organization began deliberating on Monday whether to declare a global emergency over the Zika vir...

Wikimedia Commons An attempt to plant transgenic cotton for research purposes in Costa Rica is being challenged in court. According to a news report recently filed by Carlos Arrieta Perez of online news daily El Pais, a legislator from Frente Amplio (Broad Front) and a few non-profit groups dedicated to environmental protection claim that the transgenic cotton seeds contain traces of Agent Ora...

The Ministry of Public Health has confirmed two cases of the Zika virus in Costa Rica, and those two infections were enough for one traveler in from Minnesota to cancel an upcoming vacation in our country. According to a news report filed by Rochelle Olson of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, travel agents in that North American metropolis are warning their clients about the dangerous virus, which is ...

Wikimedia Commons London, Jan 27 (EFE).- A team of U.S. researchers has developed a method for screening thousands of chemicals for toxicity without testing them on animals, an article in the scientific journal Nature Communications said. A team led by Ruili Huang, of the National Institutes of Health's National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, or NCATS, conducted the Tox21 stud...

H1N1 vaccine will be available in Costa Rica in March 2016. Source: Wikimedia Commons A 56-year old man from the Kingdom of the Netherlands has been listed as the 31st death caused by the H1N1 virus in Costa Rica since December. According to a news report filed by Angela Avalos of daily newspaper La Nacion, the announcement of the death was made by Minister of Public Health Fernando Llorca on ...

By Alba Santandreu Piracicaba, Brazil, Jan 27 (EFE).- Roughly 800,000 genetically modified Aedes aegypti mosquitoes are being released per week in the Brazilian city of Piracicaba to combat that insect, a transmitter of the dengue and zika viruses that has confounded health authorities in Brazil and other Latin American countries. Unlike other mosquitoes, the "good" Aedes aegypti, as it is c...

FIle photo BALTIMORE, MD (PRWEB) JANUARY 20, 2016 - As healthcare costs and complexity in the U.S. continue to spiral upward, more and more retirees are asking, “Can I get high-quality healthcare for less if I move overseas?” The simple answer is yes. The Healthcare category of the 2016 International Living Global Retirement Index ranks the healthcare systems of the 23 most popular retirement l...

Source: Rythmia The Rythmia Life Advancement Center, a luxury resort in Costa Rica that made headlines in the past due to a controversial therapy that involved the use of a psychedelic substance, has reformed its operations and is now offering holistic vacations. As previously reported by The Costa Rica Star, Rythmia was mostly known for its use of Ibogaine, a substance extracted from a few...

Happy children in Costa Rica Over the last few years, a lot of attention has been given to the importance of happiness as an intrinsic aspect of life. Many economists and sociologists agree on the concept of Gross National Happiness as a commitment to building a sovereign economy based on the affable well-being of the populace.   It so happens that Costa Rica has been recognized as ...

Wikimedia Commons Women who contemplate breast augmentation typically face a dilemma in terms of needs vs. wants. For the most part, breast augmentation procedures are performed for aesthetic reasons related to a youthful and perky look that may have been lost due to breastfeeding and the physiological changes that come with aging. As one of the most popular destinations for medical tourism...

Source: Blue Osa PUERTO JIMÉNEZ, OSA PENINSULA, Costa Rica (PRWEB) January 20, 2016 - Clean eating has grown significantly in popularity over the last year or so, encouraging people to ditch chemically enhanced and processed foods from their diet. Self-taught chef, Marie makes eating clean simple with her new cooking guide, “Eating Clean in Costa Rica.” Readers will be able to enjoy her int...

Tourists who come to Costa Rica seeking affordable dental procedures are getting younger and more attuned to the idea of going abroad for treatment, and this is a trend that can be expected to expand this decade. As the North American members of the Millennial Generation join the workforce and the enterprise world, the dental industry is rushing to understand these young adults for the purpose ...

Wikimedia Commons Los Angeles, Jan 16 (EFE).- Dozens of residents in Lynwood, California, accepted the city's challenge Saturday to lose weight and at the same time take home $3,500 and learn what they need to know about diet and exercise. The municipal government of this city in Los Angeles County is into its seventh "Cash for Chunkers" program, which aims to motivate the community to stay...