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Pittsfield reports two cases of West Nile virus

Aug 04, 2023 12:46 am

Meg Britton-Mehlisch reports in The Berkshire Eagle that after a drought, floods, smoke, heat, and spongy moths this summer, Pittsfield has two documented cases of mosquitoes carrying West Nile virus in recent weeks. And members of the city’s Board of Health want to spray pesticides to reduce the population of mosquitoes, but the city council voted in 2021 to stop allowing truck-mounted spraying to control mosquitoes. Chris Horton, director of the Berkshire Mosquito Control Project, said the July flooding led to many more mosquitoes. Horton said, “We’re still doing larval control everywhere but when the [Housatonic] river flooded that was — we couldn’t even have access to the [area] and the mosquitoes were already coming off.... The water was too deep to even go through and put the larvicide in.” The Board of Health is now asking the Pittsfield City Council to meet on the mosquito issue. Read more about this story in The Berkshire Eagle.