While mosquitos will soon be buzzing through the humid summer air across the region — with some of them carrying West Nile Virus — now is the time to take precautions to prevent the pests from breeding around your home and family.
The Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta said that 2012 was one of the largest West Nile Virus outbreaks ever seen, with more than 2,600 serious illness cases reported across the country and 243 deaths.
CDC website data shows that in Pennsylvania, 50 human cases were reported statewide with one of those in McKean County.
As far as whether this year’s season will be just as severe is not yet certain, health officials said.
For her part, Amanda Witman, press aide at the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, said, “with regard to the season this year, it’s far too early to tell how it will be.
“Most of the county-based West Nile Virus programs began surveillance (mosquito trapping and testing) this month,” Witman said. “The Pennsylvania state program will begin in May. We don’t typically forecast the seasons, but a good barometer is the date of the first incidence.”
Witman said that last year, the first mosquito positive was found on May 4.
“The average is mid-June, however, we don’t have any positives at this point,” Witman said.
The disease is passed by infected mosquitos and can be transmitted to birds, horses, humans and other animals. In 2000, West Nile Virus appeared for the first time in Pennsylvania in birds, mosquitoes and a horse.
There is no specific vaccine or treatment for West Nile Virus infection in humans. Therefore, prevention of mosquito bites is extremely important.
Holli Senior of the Pennsylvania Department of Health stressed the importance of preventing the virus by eliminating places where mosquitos can lay eggs.
“Remove standing water around your home where mosquitos breed,” Senior said. “Turn over plastic toys, wheelbarrows, bird baths, ditches, gutters and similar areas.”
Senior also recommended wearing insect repellent with DEET and light colored clothing as mosquitos are attracted to dark colored clothing.
“Keeping lawns properly mowed can also help to reduce standing water on lawns and mosquito populations,” said Senior.
Although 80 percent of people who contract West Nile Virus will not show any symptoms at all, others will experience mild, flu-like symptoms known as West Nile Fever. Symptoms include fever, headache, and body aches, nausea, vomiting and sometimes swollen lymph glands of a skin rash on the chest, stomach and back.
West Nile Fever can last for as short as a few days, though even healthy people have become sick for several weeks.
About one in 150 people infected with the virus will develop severe, neuroinvasive illness. The sever symptoms can include high fever, headache, neck stiffness, stupor, disorientation, coma, tremors, convulsions, muscle weakness, vision loss, numbness and paralysis. These symptoms may last several weeks, and neurological effects may be permanent. Persons with an impaired immune system are especially at risk, as those with diabetes and hypertension and senior citizens.
