FDA Approves First Human Trials Of Zika Vaccine

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MIAMI (CBSMiami) -- The FDA has given an experimental Zika vaccine the green light for safety testing in people. Researchers hope the vaccine will help prime the immune system to combat the mosquito-borne virus which is linked to birth defects.

Inovio Pharmaceuticals, based in Pennsylvania, and GeneOne Life Science, based in Seoul, South Korea, worked together on the vaccine. They previously collaborated to create vaccines for Ebola and MERS, both of which are being tested.

The Zika vaccine will first be tested in 40 healthy volunteers. The first tests in humans should start in the next few weeks, Inovio said in a news release.

If successful in this first round of human testing, it will need additional approval for further testing.

There are 160 known cases of Zika in Florida, 58 in Miami-Dade and another 26 in Broward.

Zika has been sweeping through Latin America and the Caribbean in recent months, and the fear is that it will get worse there and arrive in the U.S. with the onset of mosquito season this summer. Zika causes only a mild and brief illness, at worst, in most people. But it can cause fetal deaths and severe birth defects in the children of women infected during pregnancy.