SAN JOSE – Santa Clara County public well being officers are advising residents to “dump, drain and clean” any nonetheless water from their yards after detecting the primary occasion of an invasive mosquito species this yr.
The Aedes aegypti mosquito was detected within the Santa Teresa neighborhood of South San Jose, the place two grownup mosquitoes had been trapped — that means that the species survived the winter after they had been discovered final yr, county public well being officers stated at a information convention Thursday.
“This mosquito is tiny, but it has a massive impact to the community and the health of our community,” stated Edgar Nolasco, director of the County of Santa Clara Client and Environmental Safety Company. “There’s a day-biting mosquito, highly aggressive in nature and it has the capability of transmitting diseases such as Zika, chikungunya, dengue and yellow fever.”
The return of the mosquitoes marks an “inflection point” of whether or not the pest will be capable of stay in the neighborhood and unfold illness, stated Dr. Sarah Rudman, performing well being officer and director of the Public Well being Division.
Final yr, the county trapped 388 invasive mosquitoes in six places in San Jose, Santa Clara and Gilroy, officers stated in a press launch. The mosquitoes, which originated in Africa and can be present in South America, are a couple of quarter-inch in dimension and have black and white stripes on their backs and legs. They often solely journey inside 500 ft of the place they hatch, and so they feed “almost exclusively” on people.
The species has turn out to be established — that means it has a self-sustaining inhabitants — in 22 counties throughout California, primarily within the southern and central components of the state, officers stated.
As a way to fight the species’ persevering with presence, the county is rising its monitoring and surveillance crew, placing extra traps in areas the place the mosquitoes are noticed, rising neighborhood outreach and conducting extra door to door inspections, stated Dr. Nayer Zahiri, supervisor of the Vector Management District. She added that the county can be working with different vector management districts which can be coping with the identical invasive mosquito.
“The threat of this dangerous mosquito is growing,” Zahiri stated. “This is the second year in a row we have found the day-biting mosquito in the Santa Teresa neighborhood of South San Jose.”
Zahiri added that the truth that the mosquitoes have been discovered for a second yr in a row “means it is becoming more likely that this mosquito is here to stay.”
Rudman added that the chance of somebody in Santa Clara County contracting an sickness like Zika or dengue fever from a mosquito continues to be “effectively zero” as a result of the mosquito would first need to chunk somebody who carried the illness. However she famous that the variety of individuals contracting these ailments outdoors of the county then returning has elevated: in 2020, seven instances of dengue traveled into the county, however in 2024, that quantity rose to nearly 50 instances.
“What’s changing now is if this invasive mosquito becomes endemic here, eventually these diseases will spread here at home, causing severe risk, including risk of death to certain populations,” Rudman stated.
Nolasco stated that the early detection of the invasive mosquitoes permits the county to probably management their unfold.
The mosquitoes can breed in standing water, so public well being officers are asking that county residents enable vector management technicians to offer free inspections and recommendation, Nolasco stated. Residents ought to report any mosquitoes they see, and they need to be certain that they dump, drain and clear any containers with standing water in yards, Zahiri stated. The county’s emergency alert system may even ship out notifications about mosquito sightings and treatements taking place in particular neighborhoods, officers stated.
To successfully clear out containers that held standing water, officers advocate scrubbing them with scorching, soapy water or a diluted bleach answer, in line with a press launch from the Vector Management District. The eggs seem like tiny bits of grime to the bare eye and are about half a millimeter in dimension. Out of doors water containers that needs to be cleaned embody fowl baths and pet dishes.
“The community is our first line of defense,” Nolasco stated. “Let’s protect our community, our health and our quality of life.”
Any sightings of day-biting mosquitoes needs to be reported to the Vector Management District at 408-918-4770 or vectorinfo@cep.sccgov.org.
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