Cass County Vector Control Director Ben Prather’s interview with The Flag’s Steve Hallstrom
CASS COUNTY, ND – Officials with Cass County Vector Control are sounding the alarm regarding West Nile Virus.
“We’ve actually seen a very high activity for West Nile Virus,” Cass County Vector Control Director Ben Prather told The Flag’s Steve Hallstrom Show. “We’re seeing a lot of mosquitos that are transmitting West Nile.”
In fact, Prather says the numbers ‘are probably double of’ numbers they’ve seen in the last five years.
“We’re seeing some of our mosquito trap counts coming back with significant numbers that are infected,” he said. “We’re seeing just overall large numbers in our nuisance traps.”
Prather says the community needs to take precautions regardless oof where they’re at in the metro area, as positive mosquitos have been located in both Cass and Clay counties. He says neighboring counties are also finding mosquitoes that are transmitting the virus – signaling active infection.
Prather warns those with health concerns or who have challenges to apply bug spray.
“Even one bite might be too much for you,” he said.
As of Monday afternoon, three birds and 16 mosquito pools have been identified as having West Nile Virus activity. In Cass County, three birds and three mosquito pools are among those. As of Tuesday, no human cases are being identified.
“We kind of are anticipating some human cases here to pop up maybe in the next week or two,” Prather said. “But we’re really going to be targeting sprays in the future here once we start seeing those types of things happen. And I think it might be kind of a busy year on the West Nile front.”
Flag Family News has reached out to officials with Sanford and Essentia Health regarding West Nile cases.
