Publication: Daily Nation
Paper Page:27A
Paper Date: Wed, Jul 25, 2000
Byline: Compiled by Terry Ally
|
Page sponsored by The Tourism Development Corporation |
by Dawn Morgan
ANNUAL "frequent flyers" into Barbados may be carrying the West Nile virus (WNV) which causes severe encephalitis (swelling of the brain) in humans. So said Professor Paul Levett, clinical microbiologist at the Cave Hill Campus of the University of the West Indies, on Wednesday night in his lecture What Have We Learnt In The 20th Century?
"I don't think it needs a crystal ball to predict that WNV will eventually come to Barbados," he added.
These "visitors", however, are not human tourists but migratory birds, carrying the virus, which can be spread by mosquitoes and ticks to birds and eventually to humans.
Levett said WNV found in New York "was the same strain which appeared in Israel in 1998". The disease, which first felled the common crow in New York, and the Eastern Seaboard, then moved southward, most recently being found in Florida. Seven New Yorkers were killed by the virus in 1999 and another 62 became sick from encephalitis. Last year, the virus was found in 32 mosquitoes and 25 birds in New York and five suburban cities.
The microbiologist said that unlike dengue fevers, which are spread by only two types of mosquitoes, "WNV is spread by over 40 types, mainly culex" and "one of them is found here".
Scientists say there is no evidence WNV can be
spread from human to human, nor is there evidence it can be contracted by
handling infected birds. Levett also warned that unless Barbadians cleaned
up breeding sites for the Aedes Aegypti mosquito, there could be a future
epidemic of the haemorrhagic type of dengue, which is often fatal.
SENIOR Medical Officer Dr. Ronald Knight, who heads the Vector Control Programme, has reiterated a view expressed last August that Barbadians were at minimal risk of contracting the deadly mosquito-borne virus, which surfaced in New York in 1999. He said this was because the vector, or carrier of the disease, was still not part of the local landscape.
"It is no great mystery or surprise that a visitor may transport a disease across international borders," he said, "but in the case of the West Nile virus, it is currently not one of the vectors we have identified. Any infection can get into a country in a traveller."
THE Barbados Light & Power Company has promised environmental restoration of areas along the ABC Highway which were excavated for its new 69KV underground cable. The Green Page last week asked the company about its plan to avert environmental problems after the cable was laid. Its contractor, Associated Consulting Engineers Limited, said it would pay attention to four specific areas:
The official also said that the work which was scheduled to be completed next January should be finished by October. These Glen Hinkson pictures show how the green areas were excavated for the laying of the cable. All these areas will be re-grassed after the work is completed.