Impact of Rising US Mosquito Population on Health Risks

Experts: Rise in Malaria Cases in Texas and Florida Not Cause for Panic

Even as mosquito populations are on the rise, public health experts suggest that the cases of malaria found in both Texas and Florida may not be cause for widespread panic.

“I feel confident we have had a good public health response,” said Andrea Berry, an infectious disease expert from the University of Maryland, in an interview with the Washington Examiner. “This is alarm bells for the public health workers. It’s not alarm bells for people.”

Four individuals in Florida and one in Texas tested positive for malaria in late June, marking the most recent U.S. domestic malaria infections since a contained outbreak in Palm Beach, Florida, in 2003.

Numerous reports have surfaced regarding the rise in local mosquito populations since discovering mosquitoes infected with malaria-causing parasites were confirmed last week, with many attributing the increase to climate change and rising temperatures.

While record-setting temperatures may be contributing to the bug problem, other evidence suggests that urbanization and diminishing residual levels of the insecticide DDT have had a larger effect on increasing certain types of mosquito populations than temperatures alone.

Marm Kilpatrick of the University of California San Diego published a paper in Nature Communications in 2016 examining mosquito populations in New York, New Jersey, and California. His study found that the build-up of cities hindered some types of mosquitoes but allowed others, known as urban mosquitoes, to thrive. The study also explained that, in certain regions, DDT, which was banned in the U.S. after its effects on birds and mammals were discovered in the late 1960s, has had a lasting impact on terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems that has only started to wane in recent decades.

Kilpatrick told the Washington Examiner that the insects that transmit malaria, Anopheles mosquitoes, thrive in the wetlands that are often drained for urbanization, decreasing their overall possible public health risk. However, mosquitoes that transmit other deadly viruses to humans, such as West Nile virus and Dengue, are increasing because they thrive in city or suburban environments.

“There are malaria-transmitting mosquitoes in many states in the U.S., so it’s possible for it to be transmitted in many states,” Kilpatrick said. “The main reason it is not transmitted now is because most of us live in mosquito-proof houses and because there is a large public health response when malaria is detected.”

Both Berry and Kilpatrick emphasized that living with screened windows and air conditioning has dramatically decreased the spread of mosquito-borne diseases, like malaria. Not only do these measures prevent individuals from being bitten by infected mosquitoes, but they also prevent mosquitoes from catching the disease by biting infected humans, cutting off the life-cycle of disease-causing parasites.

Although both the Florida Health Department and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have issued health warnings about the potential outbreak, Berry and Kilpatrick contend that the measures taken thus far have not only been designed to contain the spread of malaria but also demonstrated the resilience of public health infrastructure.

“What’s happened really is a great public health response in the news. People are talking about it, they’re doing the bug catches … they’re just doing the basic epidemiology. They’re getting the word out,” Berry said.

Click here to read more from the Washington Examiner

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