{"id":28704,"date":"2024-06-21T04:17:24","date_gmt":"2024-06-21T09:17:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=28704"},"modified":"2024-06-21T04:17:28","modified_gmt":"2024-06-21T09:17:28","slug":"a-record-breaking-number-of-mosquitoes-are-carrying-west-nile-virus-around-las-vegas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=28704","title":{"rendered":"A record-breaking number of mosquitoes are carrying West Nile virus around Las Vegas"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A record-breaking number of mosquitoes in and around Las Vegas are carrying West Nile virus, sparking warnings from local health officials who say the public should take precautions<\/a> to avoid getting bit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

West Nile virus can cause fever, headaches, vomiting and diarrhea and is fatal in about 1 of 150 cases. There are no vaccines or medications to treat or prevent the mosquito-borne illness<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In recent weeks, 169 of over 24,000 pools of mosquitoes tested for West Nile virus returned positive \u2014 meaning at least one insect in the pool carried the disease \u2014 across 25 southern Nevada ZIP codes. The number of mosquitoes recorded and the tally of positive pools this early in the season break the area\u2019s records for both metrics, set in 2019. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThese are huge numbers of mosquitoes, and we\u2019ve already identified a concerning number of them carrying the West Nile virus,\u201d said Vivek Raman, an environmental health supervisor for the Southern Nevada Health District.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Health officials have also identified six pools in the Las Vegas area that tested positive for St. Louis encephalitis virus, a mosquito-borne disease that can cause fatal inflammation of the brain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For decades, climate scientists and public health officials have warned that climate change could expand the reach of various infectious diseases<\/a>, especially those spread by mosquitoes<\/a>. Las Vegas\u2019 exploding mosquito population and the local uptick in West Nile prevalence offers an important case study on how climate could affect human health.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Climate change increases average global temperatures and precipitation levels, fostering conditions that are ideal for mosquitoes, which breed in still, warm water. It also extends the length of warm periods, prolonging the active season for mosquitoes. These changes increase the risk of human exposure<\/a> to diseases like West Nile virus, even in places that have never recorded cases before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first case of West Nile virus in Las Vegas was recorded in 2004 \u2014 five years after the United States\u2019 first case was documented in 1999 in New York City. Las Vegas\u2019 most recent West Nile outbreak occurred five years ago, resulting in 43 human cases. District health officials are concerned that this summer could be far worse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Nevada and much of the Southwest, springtime weather has become warmer<\/a> and summertime heat waves have grown increasingly extreme over the last few decades. Las Vegas has seen average springtime temperatures rise by 6.2 F since 1970<\/a>; this month, the city has already experienced a weeklong, record-breaking heat wave<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Southern Nevada\u2019s rising temperatures are creating favorable conditions for mosquitoes, said Nischay Mishra, an assistant professor of epidemiology at Columbia University. What\u2019s more, ongoing drought conditions in the state, which have led to low water table levels throughout the Colorado River Basin, including in Lake Mead<\/a>, may also be counterintuitively beneficial for the insects. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMosquitoes typically thrive in wet and hot places,\u201d Mishra said. \u201cBut in Nevada, as smaller bodies of water dry up, they create shallow waters that are ideal for mosquito breeding.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Las Vegas\u2019 mosquito surge has been giant: Last year, district health officials measured 6,000 mosquitos in traps across Clark County from April to June. This year, counts have already exceeded 24,000. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The vast majority have been Culex mosquitoes, a primary vector for West Nile virus. But another mosquito species that does not carry the virus, Aedes aegypti, has also become more common in Las Vegas. Aedes was first spotted in the area in 2017, and Raman attributes its spread there to the impacts of climate change, as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Along with climate, human behavior plays an important role in the spread of vector-borne diseases. Aedes and Culex mosquitoes both thrive in the backyards of many Las Vegas homes \u2014 the former breed in small pools of water such as those left from sprinklers, while the latter often breed along the surface of unmaintained swimming pools.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Raman said the best way to avoid infection is to empty any open containers filled with water outside, maintain swimming pools, wear protective clothing and use bug spray to avoid getting bit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Louise Ivers, a professor of global health and social medicine at Harvard Medical School and the director of its Global Health Institute, said situations like the one in Las Vegas will become more common as climate change continues to boost infectious disease globally. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe should expect to see new infectious diseases, old infectious diseases back again and a change in the patterns of exposure of existing infectious diseases like West Nile virus,\u201d Ivers said. \u201cThings that we used to do freely without worrying as much about protection from vectors like mosquitoes or ticks, we might not be able to do anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nbcnews<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A record-breaking number of mosquitoes in and around Las Vegas are carrying West Nile virus, sparking warnings from local health officials who say the public should take precautions to avoid getting bit.  West Nile virus can cause fever, headaches, vomiting and diarrhea and is fatal in about 1 of 150 cases. There are no vaccines or medications […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":28705,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5784],"tags":[2399,4639,29186,29187,1912],"class_list":["post-28704","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","tag-disease","tag-las-vegas","tag-mosquito-bites","tag-mosquito-population","tag-virus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28704","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28704"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28704\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28706,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28704\/revisions\/28706"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/28705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}