Complacency and apathy may have played a role in recent spike of West Nile cases

With nearly 1,600 cases of West Nile Virus and 66 mortalities reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) nationwide, officials are calling the recent West Nile virus outbreak the largest ever seen in the United States.

Steve Presley is a zoonotic disease researcher at The Institute of Environmental and Human Health at Texas Tech University and the chairman of the City of Lubbock Board of Health. He stated complacency and apathy probably have played a role in the recent spike of recorded cases since interest in the now-endemic disease has tapered off after the initial nationwide spread of the disease in 2002 and 2003.

“It’s very concerning what is going on in Dallas and Tarrant counties,” Presley said. “As a good comparison, Harris County, which is Houston, has seven cases. Fort Bend southwest of Houston has two cases. Come up here to Tarrant, and there are 136 cases, Dallas has 158 cases and Denton has 82. It’s just a tiny pocket there in that huge urban area Metroplex where it’s just rampant.”

Last year’s drought, recent on-and-off rains in the Metroplex and people forgetting to empty containers of water around properties all have played a role in the increase of mosquito populations in these urban areas, he said. Though unconfirmed, Presley stated it’s also possible the virus may have mutated into a more virulent form, since more cases of neuro-invasive West Nile virus have been reported than the one causing flu-like symptoms.

“I would not be surprised if the virus hasn’t changed in its virulence,” Presley said. “That’s what viruses do. Of the some of the recent cases in Texas, 440 were West Nile neuro-invasive and 450 were West Nile fever. But you have to be careful with those statistics. With West Nile fever, the majority of fever sufferers do not report it because they think it’s a summer cold. They do not go to the doctor, so it’s never diagnosed. These 290 human cases are confirmed through blood tests.”

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Submited at Sunday, September 2nd, 2012 at 12:15 am on Uncategorized by Gillan
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