West Nile Cases Increasing Faster Than Ever

Newswise – In the wake of the recent SARS and Bird Flu scares, most ofus have forgotten about the West Nile virus. But scientistsare still concerned about West Nile and they’ve discovered aquick new way that mosquitoes can pass West Nile virus toeach other. This study may explain why the West Nile Virushas spread so quickly across the U.S., despite predictionsthat it would gradually die out.

In the current understanding of West Nile transmission,mosquitoes get the virus when they bite birds with highlevels of the virus in their blood, due to being bittenearlier by infected mosquitoes. Infected birds are necessaryintermediates for transmitting the disease to humans. Butnew experiments show that when both infected and uninfectedmosquitoes feed on previously uninfected laboratory mice,the virus can pass from mosquito to mosquito within an hour.This means that transmission to humans can be much morerapid that previously thought.

“We were amazed to see that it could happen,” saysresearcher Stephen Higgs. “None of the models that haveattempted to predict the spread of West Nile virus take intoaccount the possibility that large mammals such as horsesmay be involved in the proliferation of this virus. Directtransfer of virus from the infected mosquitoes thatinitially feed on them to others that feed on themafterwards, could significantly accelerate the spread of thedisease. Instead of only birds infecting mosquitoes, allsorts of animals may be involved, and transmission could behappening much faster [than we thought].”

There’s even some evidence that West Nile virus is a form ofbioterrorism devised by Saddam Hussein. There’smore going on in the world than gets into our newspapers?andthe alienagenda is one example of this. Keep up with REAL news aboutotherworldlycontacts?become asubscriber to unknowncountry.com and listen to your veryown special interview every week!

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