Positive West Nile Virus Samples Found In 2 Pittsburgh Neighborhoods
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PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- Mosquitoes in two Pittsburgh neighborhoods have tested positive for West Nile virus.
The enemy is small and annoying said one man walking through Wind Gap on Tuesday.
"I don't know what's flying up in my face!"
He may not, but Donald Paul sure does – mosquitoes a plenty.
"Oh yeah, Oh yeah," says Paul, who has at his right hand an electronic zapper which he readily swings through the air like a tennis racket. "I hit 'em and they go pop! But I can't rid the whole neighborhood."
KDKA's John Shumway Reports:
Which is where the Allegheny County Health Department's spray truck comes in.
"We're starting this week because its much earlier the year," says the ACHD's main bug guy, Bill Todaro. "We're getting a lot more mosquitoes, high numbers mosquitoes, and very high incidence of virus in these mosquitoes."
ACHD has been setting traps in recent weeks and watched the mosquito population balloon. The skeeters caught in traps in Wind Gap and the North Side have both come back positive for carrying high levels of the West Nile Virus. So the spraying starts Thursday night, July 26, in Wind Gap and the North Side, with effort to come in the East End and South Side.
While the medical impact to a person bit by a West Nile-carrying mosquito can be devastating, Todaro says, "For most of us, it's like the summer flu, and we don't feel much at all."
So they'll drive the spraying truck through the neighborhoods misting a fine spray of a pesticide deadly to mosquitoes, but harmless to people.
The truck will operate between 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. Thursday night, which will move to Friday if it rains during the same hours.
More neighborhoods will come soon, but in the meantime, the health department says to reduce your risk of being a blood meal for mosquitoes, clear out all standing water. Todaro says that's where they like to breed.
"Catch basins, people's yards, bird baths, buckets, pails, kiddie pools, and unmaintained gutters on the roof," he said.
Tires are a major water pooling area, and a single small pool of water could produce thousands of mosquitoes.
The battle against the mosquitoes has only begun, Todaro says it will be with us into early October.