What to know about rare potentially deadly mosquito-borne virus

good afternoon folks thanks so much for joining me here on Wave now I'm Myra and Sari hope you're having a good Tuesday so far so I want to talk about a story that I read a little bit about yesterday um if you watch Nightly News NBC Nightly News you may have caught the segment on it um it a is a mosquito a very rare mosquito virus that is going around in parts of the Northeast it's called Eastern equin en sephtis also known as Triple E and it caught my attention because it's kind of concerning um the impacts of this virus I'd never heard of it so I wanted to dig in a little bit more and talk to our local experts about Triple E so today we are teaming up with Dr Christina Bryant the associate medical director of Louisville Metro public health and wellness and she's also a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Norton children's and also Matt Vanderpool the Louisville Metro Public Health and Wellness environmental health specialist we talk about mosquitoes West Nile a lot um Matt but this Triple E Eastern equin and sephtis is new to me what can you tell us about it so um Eastern and sephtis it's been around for a really long time it's not like it's something that just magically just sort of popped up um and we see it in a lot of the states that that border Kentucky um but thankfully we've never seen it in Jefferson County so that's good but uh Eastern ecin and sephtis is actually cycled through birds in a pretty similar way that westn virus is so infected Birds would give it to mosquitoes and then one particular species of mosquito that prefers to bite Birds would cyc it through mosquitoes and other birds and mosquitoes and other birds um and then if you have the potential of U getting the disease you have what are called Bridge factors so they're um locally we have three uh species of mosquitoes that can act as Bridge vectors from birds to people um it's important to understand that some mosquitoes just like different people they have different food sources that they prefer so one mosquito prefers to eat bird or you know bite birds so they're constantly biting Birds but others will bite birds or bite people just kind of theor sport or whatever they can find um so the good news is that of the mosquitoes that we have locally that could carry and be Bridge vectors for Eastern equine and citis they're actually not in great abundance um so yeah it's a possibility uh however we don't see a lot of them and we actually test for Eastern aquine and sephtis in our uh surveillance program for mosquito born illness mosquito born disease and no matter what mosquito virus that people might potentially be concerned about I me the real Takeo message is always going to be make sure that you're removing standing bar from your property um you're wearing insect repellent when you're outside and you're just taking those regular steps day after day after day when you know that you're going to be outside because it doesn't really matter where you are in the community you're going to have mosquito somewhere close to you absolutely and the concern with uh Triple E is that it is rare but it can be very serious um the virus can cause severe swelling of the brain um symptoms include fever headache vomiting and behavioral changes um and the concern is just recently um that uh Triple E uh a man in Massachusetts 80-year old man um in war Worchester County died from this virus um not long after they detected the virus in that area am I understanding some of this correctly Matt I that's my understanding from the from the news story and one of the mosquitoes that can carry uh Eastern U and sephtis actually prefers to breed in salt marshes so anytime that you're going to be on the Eastern seaboards you're going to have a potentially greater uh uh impact there because you do have salt marches thankfully we don't have salt marches uh in this area so that's one of the reasons why those mosquito numbers are are a lot lower so from what I understand Matt am I understanding you correctly that we haven't had any cases here in our area um in Kentucky but we do have the three types of mosquitoes that could potentially carry this virus is that correct yes that is correct okay um so Dr bran I want to bring you in because you also monitor things like this um what is the concern um that you want to let people know about it is Labor Day weekend as we're coming into the holiday weekend a lot of folks may be traveling if they're traveling in that part of the country do they need to be worried um well I I will say that Eastern nein and sephtis virus is rare um Matt mentioned that we've never had a case here in Jefferson County it's also rare in Massachusetts where um the um gentleman that uh developed Triple E uh lives so it's rare there too but um it is a potentially serious infection so people are infected by the bite of a mosquito like some other mosquito born illnesses that we've talked about some people have no symptoms some people have fever and muscle aches um and they get better after a few days um but some people develop serious neurologic illness the virus affects the brain um causes um an inflammation of the brain called incilius or am menitis and when incilius develops the mor morality rate is really high um 30% um and so um yes I if people are traveling to a place um where uh there have been cases of Eastern ecin and sephtis um they definitely want to take steps to protect themselves with uh uh um to protect themselves against misquito bit and that includes wearing an insect repellent um you know Matt through some of the prevention steps um but you know even though we've not had triple E here we do have mosquitoes that carry viruses that can cause illness we have West Nile Virus um uh potentially and so no matter where people are it's important to take steps to protect yourself uh against mosquito bites um I will say if people are traveling for the holiday weekend um they come home and they develop uh fever then um when they go to the the doctor It's always important to share um with their doctor or health care professional that they've been traveling um because different viruses are more common in different parts of the country um according to the CDC thank you Dr um Bryant for that uh an estimated 30% of those infected they will unfortunately die and survivors are often permanently disabled suffering from long-term neurological problems in this link I've added a uh if you want to learn more about Triple E you can go to the cdc's website to learn more information um so it sounds like we're very fortunate we don't have this uh rare deadly virus here in our area but just that we all need to be cautious um Matt you mentioned you know taking precautions again can you run through some of those for our viewers right now sure um most mosquitoes are active in the evenings and yeah with the temperatures like what we're seeing right now it's really hot people don't want to be out during the day and if they're going to be outside they're probably going to be out during the evenings um if you're going to be out during the evenings you're going to potentially you know be around where mosquitoes are going to be and that's pretty much everywhere outside um you need to wear insect propellant there's several different types of insect propellent that you can wear that are effective um and you know our website uh and the cbc's website has lots of information about that um without you know going into all the detail but there's lots of great stuff that you can use um if you want to be outside you can actually direct a fan to blow on high across you because mosquitoes fly really really slowly and poorly only about two miles an hour so you know strong Breeze can kind of blow them away from you um not that you know you really want to be wearing the long sleeves and long pants in this kind of weather but long sleeves and long pants will protect you somewhat um from mosquito bites from you know most mosquitoes um and it's also important that mosquitoes find you by your smell so any kind of like loans or perfumes that you might wear that are going to make you smell more like a flour are probably going to make you easier to find for mosquito so outside in the evenings then make sure not to wear like perfume scented deodorants um really flowery smelling uh detergents and and things like that can potentially draw them that's a good point I didn't even think about that I'm glad you mentioned that now I know in the Metro uh there are Citywide efforts for um mosquito fogging and that sort of thing a lot of times people hire private companies to spray their yards um will that help deter some of this from spreading in our area well the the Metro uh vector control team actually does mosquito fogging operations based on the presence of disease within Metro so we have a lot of surveillance traps that we put out throughout Lille and when we bring those mosquitoes back in we treat those mosquitoes or we uh test those mosquitoes inhouse uh for different Vector born diseases that we have the potential of having in Jefferson County when those come back positive then we schedule fogging routes uh to knock down the adult population so we're laral mosquitoes generally they're not going to have any of this disease it gets picked up from birds so we're only looking at the adults when we're out spraying at night so we want to spray in the areas where we've got positive adult mosquitoes to knock down their numbers to reduce the potential disease transmission to people and we do that all throughout the summer um just you know to keep keep Lilian healthy um Dr Brian as far as the medical aspect of this goes um what do you think that folks need to know that um can kind of just keep them safe and I it sounds like we shouldn't Panic about this right this is west Nile may be more of a concern for us than Triple E is ju Don't Panic um we again we've never had a case of Triple E in Je County um so that's reassuring but we do have illnesses that are spread by mosquito bites um and so people should take precautions um against mosquito bites um and uh part of that includes uh using insect repellent and part of that includes taking the other good steps that Matt mentioned we just think about about Triple E for a second um there is no treatment for it um there is no vaccine um prevention is really key um and so whether you're staying in Louisville for the holiday weekend or you're traveling to the Northeast where um a case of Triple E has been identified take steps to protect yourself against mosquito bites okay perfect um Matt Dr Bryan is there anything that I did not ask you both that you want our viewers to know about in regards to Triple E or the West Nile virus or mosquitoes in general because they are out in full force right now um you know um wearing mosquito repellent is important for both children and adults um if parents have questions about which mosquito repellants are most appropriate for young children um they should check with their pediatrician all right and it's it's also important to realize that mosquitoes breed in standing water they're not going to be breeding in flowing water if you have a stream behind your house that's flowing and has fish that's not going to be a problem generally speaking ponds aren't really a problem for mosquitoes either because they have you know uh ecosystems that help control mosquitoes in that water but stagnant swimming pools uh tires uh clogged up gutters um fountains that aren't running anymore uh flower pot saucers even small accumulations of water can mosquitoes so while you're walking around your yard just you know normal Daily Business um you want to do your due diligence and see if there are any of these small areas of standing water even like the down spout extensions on your sophs um there's just enough water that sits in those to breed several uh several hundred mosquitoes you know especially if they you know run through your planting beds and they're holding water so just you know be diligent look for standing water around your yard look for standing water around your neighbor's yard say Hey you know the mosquitoes are kind of bad did you notice that you know your kids have these toys in the backyard they're holding water um so yeah it's it's protecting yourself with insect repellent but it's also reducing the uh the breeding sites that mosquitoes have around your house and your neighbor's houses are mosquitoes drawn to certain blood types do we know or you mentioned the fragrances so there's some conflicting uh research one way or the other it's not so much blood type um mosquitoes find us in a variety of ways um the primary indicator that mosquitoes use is carbon dioxide so just as we normally exhale um we're exhaling carbon dioxide and that's the key uh trigger but they also can queue in on metabolic smells um that your body gives off just um burning energy uh some medications um have been uh uh shown to potentially make you smell different and mosquitoes will start biting you uh even some types of foods will make you smell a little bit better to mosquitoes but mosquitoes don't have to use smell and carbon dioxide to find you there's been studies done to wear black cardboard cutouts of the favorite food source of mosquitoes have been put up and mosquitoes will still uh zero in on you know a piece of black cardboard so they can see you and they can bite you they can smell you and they can bite you and that's why it's it's important to try and deal with mosquitoes from you know as many different angles as you can all right thank you so much for this helpful helpful information uh Dr Brian and Matt Vander Po from Metro Public Health and Wellness truly appreciate your time I hope everybody stays uh healthy and happy out there um as someone who gets bit quite often this information was very helpful for me today so appreciate your time guys today I'm Myra and sorryi hope you have a wonderful day