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October 26, 2000 For more information, contact Melinda Carl, DNREC Information and Education, 302-739-4506; or Allison Taylor Levine, DHSS Division of Public Health, 302-739-2005. Eastern Equine Encephalitis Detected in Chicken Near SeafordA chicken used for mosquito-borne disease surveillance by the Division of Fish and Wildlife's Mosquito Control Section has tested positive for Eastern Equine Encephalitis (EEE), according to the Division of Public Health Laboratory. The infected bird was from a surveillance station at Woodland Ferry, about four miles southwest of Seaford along the Nanticoke River. Its blood was sampled on Oct. 18, and test results confirmed the presence of EEE virus on Wednesday. Low levels of the virus are typically found in Delaware; this is the first report this year. State health officials say there is no cause for alarm, though members of the public are advised to take common-sense precautions, including wearing long-sleeved shirts and long pants when outdoors; applying insect repellent sparingly to exposed skin, using a product containing 10-30 percent DEET; and avoiding outdoor activities in mosquito-infested areas at dawn and dusk. The Mosquito Control Section has increased surveillance activities in the Seaford-Bethel-Laurel area to see if the size of the mosquito population warrants aerial spraying. Before deciding whether to spray, state officials will consider any other indications of EEE's presence, as well as weather conditions, particularly air temperatures as the mosquito control season winds down. The Mosquito Control Section and the Division of Public Health have been conducting an EEE surveillance and monitoring program for the past 18 years. Twenty-two test chicken stations and dozens of mosquito traps around the state are monitored. EEE is an encephalitis virus that routinely occurs in songbirds; for the most part it is not fatal to wild birds. It is circulated by a difficult-to-control forestland mosquito species that feeds almost exclusively upon songbirds. Saltmarsh and freshwater floodwater mosquitoes biting infected birds can then transmit the disease to humans. Both horses and humans can contract EEE, although human cases are very uncommon. Horse owners are encouraged to have their animals vaccinated because the disease is almost always fatal in horses. There is no vaccination for humans; fatality rates for those rare individuals who contract the disease can be as high as 70 percent in children and the elderly, and up to 30 percent in healthy adults. The public health risk for EEE is largest from early August through the first killing frost, usually sometime between late October and Thanksgiving in Delaware. It is not unusual to find several instances of EEE each year in the state's virus surveillance and monitoring program, nor to have a few EEE horse cases each year. With modern mosquito control practices, the last human case in Delaware occurred in 1985. -30- Document no. 40-01/00/10/18
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