“This summer it has been overall very wet, very hot and very humid,” said Dr. Philip Armstrong, Chief Scientist at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station in New Haven.
Dr. Philip Armstrong calls those conditions a perfect storm for mosquito activity in Connecticut.
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WATCH HERE“The mosquitos, we’re not jacking them at all. We do not like them at all,” said New Haven’s Eric Cobb.
Cobb doesn’t like them, especially when those mosquitos are found carrying a virus.
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SIGN UP “Right now the conditions are ripe for further spread and increased risk,” Armstrong said.
This week, Armstrong and his team detected Eastern Equine Encephalitis (EEE) in four mosquitos in Canterbury.
“We’re detecting it a whole month earlier than we normally would, and so that’s concerning because that gives us many more weeks for the virus to continue to spread,” Armstrong said.
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He says the weather conditions have played a role in the early detection of EEE and also West Nile virus, which they detected in mosquitos across 12 towns throughout the state.
“When you’re thinking about these viruses that they carry, the infection rates are very low in the mosquito population, so they’re in the 1 in 1,000 range,” Armstrong said.
While rare, Armstrong recommends taking precautions like wearing long sleeves, applying insect repellent or avoiding unnecessary outside exposure.
“You just want to overall reduce your mosquito exposure and particularly in the evening hours in the dusk and dawn,” he said.
According to Armstrong, the last major EEE outbreak in Connecticut was in 2019, when three of the four human cases were fatal.
“With EEE virus, we tend to see fewer cases than West Nile virus, but it is life threatening and can cause severe symptoms,” Armstrong said.
He says symptoms for the viruses can vary from fever and aches to severe neurological issues that require hospitalization.
