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10,000 In LA May Have Been Infected
With West Nile
By Mike Dunne
Advocate staff writer
8-3-2



While there are 58 known cases of mosquito-borne West Nile virus in Louisiana, one state health official estimated 10,000 to 12,000 other people have been infected, felt no symptoms and are now immune to the disease.
 
West Nile virus has claimed four lives, two in East Baton Rouge Parish. Twelve of the 58 cases are from East Baton Rouge Parish. On Tuesday, Dr. Louis Cataldie, the parish's coroner, confirmed the disease caused the death of an 83-year-old woman, and now state officials have added a 75-year-old man to the list.
 
The outbreak in Louisiana will soon be the nation's largest since the disease came to the United States in 1999. The virus has also begun to spread across the state from the initial outbreak around Lake Pontchartrain with human cases confirmed in Calcasieu, Allen and Ouachita parishes.
 
Ouachita was the site of an outbreak of St. Louis encephalitis last year that killed four and hospitalized 62 people.
 
State Epidemiologist Raoult Ratard said the state is awaiting lab results on 34 more suspected cases. Some will prove to be other diseases, he said. "There is no sign it is going to go down. This is the beginning," Ratard.
 
The outbreak could last into October and November, Ratard and other health officials said.
 
David Hood, secretary of the state Department of Health and Hospitals, said the "magnitude was greater than we expected."
 
Dr. Roy Campbell, of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said "it's not time for panic. It's a time to take action."
 
If not for the mosquito-control efforts in some parishes, Campbell said the state would see more cases.
 
The Associated Press reported at least 89 people in three states infected with West Nile, including 44 new cases confirmed Friday.
 
Mississippi reported a total of 22 cases as of Friday and the rest are from Texas.
 
During a Slidell news conference Friday releasing the latest figures, DHH Regional Medical Director Dr. Erin Brewer said "there are probably 10,000 to 12,000 people who have been infected" but experience no symptoms.
 
Ratard added "those that are not sick are lucky." He said they should have future immunity from antibodies created as the immune system fought off the infection.
 
Studies in other outbreaks around the world show that of 200 people, 179 will be infected and feel no symptoms. Another 20 will experience flulike symptoms like fever and headache, called West Nile fever. Only about one victim in 200 infected will develop encephalitis or meningitis, a swelling of the brain or brain lining.
 
People older than age 50 and those already fighting other diseases are most at risk, officials said. Of the four dead, one was a 53-year-old man from Folsom, and the other three were ages 83, 75 and 72.
 
Brewer said the best way not to get sick is "avoid getting bitten by mosquitoes." That means wearing long sleeves and pants when outdoors and wearing insect repellent, she said.
 
Gov. Mike Foster and Baton Rouge Mayor Bobby Simpson have declared states of emergency that they hope will help get additional funding to help combat the outbreak.
 
State Sen. Tom Schedler, R-Slidell, said he's been working with other state and parish officials to get additional financial resources for mosquito control agencies and other West Nile-related activities.
 
Schedler, who chairs the Senate's Health and Welfare Committee, said last year Monroe-area local governments spent $3 million fighting the St. Louis encephalitis outbreak and the Legislature's Interim Emergency Board dipped into a special fund to reimburse those agencies $781,000 of their expenses.
 
Schedler said he thinks there is only $6 million to $7 million in the fund and, based on the projected magnitude of the outbreak, "we could exhaust that pretty easily, although that is not going to happen."
 
St. Tammany Mosquito Control Director Charles Palmisano said he has spent $300,000 to $400,000 more than expected and will soon exhaust his annual $2.5 million budget. His district has set aside money for emergencies and can dip into it, he said.
 
The East Baton Rouge Mosquito Control and Rodent Abatement District has spent nearly 10 times the money on fogging and spraying this year than was spent in all of 1998, Director Matt Yates said.
 
CDC's Campbell said he and a team of more than a dozen epidemiologists are looking into the outbreak. "It was detected here last year, but there is no scientific reason it has broken out here," he said.
 
"We are wondering why we have not seen more in Florida," Yates said.
 
Based on other outbreaks, West Nile cases might not stop growing until cool weather sets in October or November, reducing mosquito activity, Campbell said.
 
Officials say the disease will remain stored in birds over the winter for future outbreaks.
 
If you or someone in your family have been affected by a West Nile virus infection, we would like to tell your story to our readers. Please call Mike Dunne at 225-388-0301 or e-mail him at mdunne@theadvocate.com
 
http://www.theadvocate.com/stories/080302/new_nile001.shtml





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