From freakout to slow burn, Zika has potential to impact business

The arrival of the Zika virus in the U.S. is raising questions. Will it affect business travel? Will it hurt recruiting in affected regions? Does it pose supply chain problems? The answer may be yes to all those questions.

Zika is spreading. The cases in the U.S., with the exception of Puerto Rico, are from people who were infected outside this country. There's an expectation that eventually the U.S. will see cases that are locally acquired, the result of a mosquito bite.

For now, Zika is largely confined to South America. In those regions where it has been spreading, businesses "are seeing staffing shortages or unwillingness for people to travel," said Don Hicks, the CEO of supply chain maker LLamasoft. The company's tools enable firms to create digital models of their supply chains to monitor and optimize operations.

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