City Council briefed on Zika virus
Same techniques used to battle West Nile virus should be effective against Zika virus
The ongoing effort to control West Nile virus will help in the battle against the Zika virus, the county’s West Nile virus surveillance coordinator told City Council on Thursday.
David Schmidt, who works for the Penn State Cooperative Extension, is in charge of the West Nile virus surveillance programs in both Lebanon and Lancaster counties.
Zika virus which is believed to cause deformities in the infants of pregnant woman contract it is prevalent in South America, but has yet to gain a foothold in the U.S. Schmidt said.
“With the Zika virus we are seeing it in South America, we are seeing it in the Caribbean, even parts of Mexico, and travel cases are coming to the United States,” he said. “But at this point no one has contracted Zika in the United States, outside of a couple of isolated incidents of sexual transmission, which is possible and is something that is getting more study.”
The Department of Health is being proactive in studying the Zika virus, which is spread by a tiny mosquito called the Asian Tiger, Schmidt said.
“The Department of Health has done some analytic work and does not feel that Lebanon city is a particularly at risk city, based on importation of some similar diseases, like chickenguyna and dengue, and based on the amount of travel to and from Lebanon County from areas where Zika is actively spreading,” he said.
Some larger cities nearby are believed to be at higher risk of exposure to Zika, but there still are many unknowns about the spread of the disease, Schmidt said.
“Lancaster County was determined to be somewhat higher risk, as were Allentown and Bethlehem,” he said. “But even in those cases we don’t know if the virus got up here if it would be spread.”
What is known is that West Nile virus is still a threat, although efforts to combat in the last decade have limited its spread to humans.
Last year, one person in Lebanon County contracted the disease, which typically causes flu-like symptoms but can also cause more serious ailments in some people, and in rare cases causing death.
West Nile virus is combated by testing mosquitoes by setting traps for them in habitats where they are likely to breed, Schmidt said. When found the larva is killed with a bactericide and adult populations are killed using spray, he said.
Also effective is eliminating standing water by disposing of discarded tires, cleaning gutters, putting screens over rain barrels and regular changing of bird bath water, Schmidt said.
That same approach will hopefully be successful in battling Zika.
“To be best prepared is to do the same things that we’ve been saying about West Nile for the past decade and a half, which is to get rid of standing water, use repellents, typical mosquito bite-prevention and mosquito-breeding prevention practices,” he said.