As reported by Wired, the World Healthorganization has declared the Zika virus a global health emergency. Public health officials are anxious about its possible link to birth defects.

But until the recent global outcry, the virus was not a top priority for researchers — and that’s a problem now that the race to understand Zika and mitigate its effects is on.

That’s precisely the type of cause that attracts Google.org, the philanthropic arm of the search giant, which doles out grants in the forms of money and brainpower to nonprofits. Today the organization announced it’s giving UNICEF a $1 million grant to fight Zika.

The donation is intended to go toward efforts to reduce mosquito populations in affected areas; support vaccine research; and work with communities and governments to prevent Zika transmission. Google.org is also embedding a team of Google engineers, data scientists and designers to help UNICEF organize the data they collect on the ground to make it more digestible to the public and other organizations working to combat Zika.

bbabo.Net