Two adults have been confirmed with the Zika virus in Ireland, health chiefs have said.
The cases - the first of their kind in the country - are unrelated to each other and both patients are said to be currently well and fully recovered.
Both individuals have a history of travel to a Zika affected country, Ireland's Health Service Executive (HSE) confirmed.
"These are the first cases of Zika virus infection confirmed in Ireland," a HSE spokeswoman said.
"Neither case is at risk of pregnancy."
The HSE said the newly-discovered Zika cases in Ireland are "not an unexpected event" as many other European countries have reported cases as a result of people travelling to affected areas.
Health chiefs have urged Irish people who fall ill within two weeks after returning from an affected area to seek medical help.
It comes as officials confirmed the first case of the Zika virus in the United States.
The virus has been confirmed in a resident of Dallas County, Texas, with the county's Health and Human Services claiming it was contracted through sexual transmission.
In medical literature, there has only been one case of Zika transmitted sexually and one case in which the virus was detected in semen.
Officials said there are no reports of the virus being locally transmitted by mosquitoes in the area.
The county said it received confirmation of the infection from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), however the CDC did not investigate how the virus was transmitted.
There have been six confirmed travel-related cases of Zika virus disease in the US, all among residents of Harris County, where Houston is located, the Texas Department of State Health Services said.
Dallas county did not identify the person infected.
The confirmation of a US case comes just a day after the World Health Organisation declared the virus an international public health emergency.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here