We Begin tonight with the West Nile Virus claiming the lives of two people here in Wisconsin thanks so much for joining us I'm Melissa langin the department of health services has also confirmed a third person has been hospitalized in this wave dis n's Adam rasmason picks up our coverage tonight in studio well Melissa those first three cases are from Fondulac Brown and adami counties but the DHS says there have also been reported cases in animals mosquitoes and blood donations across the state according to the DHS this isn't uncommon saying there's an average of around 20 cases of West Nile every single year during a press call this afternoon DHS epidemiologist Rebecca Osborne says the virus has mostly been spread by infected Birds which are bitten by mosquitoes and then transmitted to people and animals that doesn't leave many options to keep the virus contained so unfortunately this transmission cycle is such that we just don't have a feasible and realistic and E ological mechanism to eradicate it part of the difficulty comes from how West Nile develops in the body for most people symptoms are similar to the flu with fever muscle aches and exhaustion only about one in every 150 people develop the severe illness which can lead to death So Adam right now there's no vaccine for West Nile if there's no way to stop that from spreading how are people supposed to protect themselves yeah right now experts say the best things you can really do is get any standing water out of your home be sure to wear bug spray and kind of just try to avoid those times of the day morning afternoon evening where they're most active