This is Scientific American's 60 Second Science.

I'm Christine Herman.

Zegavirus infection during pregnancy has been linked to the abnormal brain development

called microcephaly.

Now a study finds more evidence for the connection.

Researchers at the CDC in the US and the National Health Institute in Columbia

found that the number of babies born with microcephylene Columbia increased more than fourfold

during a nine and a half month span in 2016 compared with the same span in 2015.

And the peak of zeka virus outbreak in pregnant women was followed approximately six months later with a peak of microcephaly reported in the country.

Margaret Honeen, chief of the birth defects branch at the CDC and a senior author of the study.

She says the finding is compelling evidence that the highest risk period for zeca virus infection

is sometime in the first half of pregnancy.

So this both adds to the evidence and helps confirm that any country

experiencing a large seekavirus outbreak should anticipate a large increase in

microcephaly. This is not unique to one geographic location such as Brazil.

What we're seeing in Colombia is very similar to what was reported in Brazil.

The study was in the CDC's Mortality and Morbidity Weekly Report.

Conane says growing evidence now exists for an association between the virus and other

defects related to a damaged central nervous system. These include defects like club foot,

joint contractures where the joints are very, very stiff,

things like congenital deafness and eye abnormalities.

In the US, the most recent cases of local transmission of CICA

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