Mosquitoes infected with West Nile Virus found in Jamaica Plain, Roslindale, Roxbury and West Roxbury

By adamg on Fri, 07/26/2024 - 2:59pm

The Boston Public Health Commission today announced the year's first batch of West Nile Virus-infected biters in Boston, in several neighborhoods.

The Commission says "the risk of transmission remains low," but says residents can reduce their risk even more through such steps as staying indoors from dusk to dawn, use government-approved repellents, including DEET, oil of lemon eucalyptus, picaridin, or IR3535, repair any torn screen windows or doors and knock over or drain everything on your property that might collect water in which the bugs could breed, including unused kiddie pools and old tires. Bird baths and the like are OK, as long you empty and clean them on the regular, the commission says. Oh, and make sure your gutters are not blocked.

Most people who are infected with West Nile Virus do not experience any signs or symptoms of illness. In some cases, however, people will experience a headache, fever, nausea, vomiting, and body aches which can last for a few days or several weeks. In most cases, individuals with mild symptoms recover on their own without needing medical assistance.

People who are older than 50 years of age are at higher risk of developing serious symptoms, including high fever, severe headache, confusion, lack of coordination, and muscle paralysis or weakness. If you or someone you know is experiencing these symptoms, contact a health care provider immediately.

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Comments

By “biters” are they’re

By Frelmont on Fri, 07/26/2024 - 4:14pm.

By “biters” are they’re saying they specifically detected human biting species and, or can it be assumed that if detected in say an exclusively bird biting species then it will eventually be in a cross biting species?

This is BPHC we are talking

By Rwgfy on Fri, 07/26/2024 - 5:09pm.

This is BPHC we are talking about. They have no clue.

Please enlighten us!

By MrZip on Fri, 07/26/2024 - 7:52pm.

Pretty sure they know the difference between Anopheles, Aedes and Culex vs other species that DONT' bite humans and transmit disease. If this place really sucks as much as you make out, feel free to relocate, I hear Florida is nice.

Shut the fuck up

By SwirlyGrrl on Fri, 07/26/2024 - 9:17pm.

You don't know anything about this or you would know that the state does the testing and much of the sampling.

BPHC knows enough that Boston has amazingly low heat hospitalization rates and health stats that belie the known demographic stresses and health inequities.

I'd say "stick to your day job", but you don't seem to have one Ketchup Boi.

That's probably Adam's language, not the BPHC's.

By Tim Mc. on Sat, 07/27/2024 - 8:18am.

But I would assume they're just putting out mosquito trap stations and testing all the mosquitoes that they catch—a broad spectrum, non-specific.

(adjusts public health hat)

By SwirlyGrrl on Sat, 07/27/2024 - 10:45am.

I've worked with the state lab on mosquito issues at a couple of different points in my career, including when WNV first made the scene. The traps are designed to be as species specific as possible (different skeeters seek different habitats and look for blood and love in different ways) and the trapped insects are individually identified and hand tallied before they are sampled for virus.

So, yes, these are absolutely human biting species that carry WNV (actually, nearly all skeeters carry WNV - including the invasive and aggressive, but still establishing tiger mosquitoes).

There is a motherlode of info on the state's program for tracking arboviruses, surveillance history, and the statewide surveillance and risk management plans: https://www.mass.gov/lists/arbovirus-surveillance-plan-and-historical-data

Emergency response plan (for major outbreaks and post-flooding messes): https://www.mass.gov/massachusetts-emergency-operations-response-plan-fo...

Thx for the info. Some of the

By Frelmont on Sat, 07/27/2024 - 1:25pm.

Thx for the info. Some of the control districts also have concise info. There’s the fifty some-odd skeeter species in Ma and there’s a subset being of public health concern. Does the state ever test (outside of the subset) non-mammal biters to glean any (virus/bird-vector) surveillance value from that? Are all the mammal biters the species of human concern, or are there exceptions?) are there mammal feeders that never choose humans? I hope the risk stays low.

https://www.mass.gov/info-details/mosquito-control-projects-and-districts