BY MICHAEL JAMES
The Sudbury and District Health Unit confirmed Monday a dead crow found in the Chelmsford area tested positive for the West Nile Virus.
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It is not, however, cause for undue concern, according to Ed Wierzbicki, an environmental support officer with the Sudbury and District Health Unit.
Â?This comes as no surprise because positive birds have been confirmed in the North Bay, Muskoka-Parry Sound and Algoma health unit jurisdictions,Â? Wierzbicki said. Â?It was just a matter of time before we discovered our first positive bird.Â?
Humans become infected with West Nile Virus (WNV) when bitten by an infected mosquito of the culex genus or cluster of species. Mosquitoes pick up the virus by feeding on the blood of certain species of birds that have been infected with WNV. Of the 74 known species of mosquitoes in Canada, WNV has been found in 10, mainly in species that feed on birds.
So far this year, the Sudbury and District Health Unit has submitted 66 dead birds for testing. Of the 66 dead birds tested, only one came back positive.
Province wide, 155 birds have tested positive for the virus. Two people have tested positive for the virus so far this year in Ontario, one near Toronto and the other in Renfrew County near Ottawa.
The Sudbury and District Health Unit will be stepping up its monitoring efforts in and around the area where the dead crow infected with the virus was found.
Â?Mosquito trapping will now be increased in the Chelmsford area,Â? he said, adding it is standard procedure after such discoveries are made.
To date, the Sudbury and District Health Unit has sent over 4,000 mosquitoes to Brock University for testing, Wierzbicki said.
Of those 4,000 mosquitoes, only about 28 were identified as the culex mosquito, the bird-biting species of
mosquito scientists have identified as a carrier of the West Nile Virus.
