Floodwaters breed hidden health dangers
West Nile, E. coli among deadly concerns in swamped Midwest
Houses and businesses are surrounded by floodwaters in the town of Louisiana, Mo. Standing water like this is the ideal breeding ground for mosquitoes and dangerous bacteria.
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Eric Thayer / Reuters
Multimedia report
Voices from the flood zone
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By Alex Johnson
Reporter
MSNBC
updated 6:55 p.m. ET June 20, 2008
Alex Johnson
Reporter
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• Profile
Now that the waters are beginning to recede after this month’s devastating floods in the Midwest, state and federal officials are warning of a widespread secondary risk from dangerous bacteria and disease-bearing mosquitoes.
Officials of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state health officials across the Midwest said they expected this season’s mosquito population to be especially big, nurtured by hot summer temperatures and large pools of standing water that make an ideal breeding ground.
“We know we have mosquitoes right now in the state that are testing positive for the West Nile virus,” Indiana State Health Commissioner Judy Monroe said.
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Indiana health officials have already found two mosquitoes infected with West Nile in Marion County, and they said they expected to see more, because smaller counties with smaller budgets haven’t had the manpower to go looking for them yet.
“The places that they’re going to have trouble with most likely is when the waters actually recede and the water gets trapped in grassy areas, in grassy fields, when it’s not actually flowing,” said Justin Manning, supervisor of rodent control for the Vanderburgh County Health Department.
Chuck Cipperley, director of environmental services for the Siouxland District Health Department in Iowa, said the Sioux City area was covered in mosquito-friendly pools of water.
“We have had a lot of water, and there is a lot of breeding ground all around us,” Cipperley said.
It’s bad news for mother like Tricia Massart of Elm Grove, Wis., whose children had been waiting for summer to start.
“The summer here is so short, and everyone just waits for summer to come, and they want to get outside and enjoy it,” Massart said. “I think if the mosquitoes try to ruin it, that would be very unfortunate.”
E. coli, tetanus feared
Stagnant water carries numerous other risks, health officials said. For any number of dangerous bacteria and parasites, hot, fetid pools left over by swamped septic systems are the perfect home.
“What you see in floodwaters are the same kind of organisms that normally exist in a community,” said Rosie Kapp, a specialist with the Rosie Kapp, a specialist with the Waukesha (Wis.) County Department of Public Health.
“E. coli is a bacteria that could be there,” Kapp said. “There’s also parasites that could be in the water, such as giardia or cryptosporidosis.”
The danger comes when the water “splashes in the eyes, the mouth — your hands are contaminated,” she said.
An msnbc.com-NBC News special report
The following NBC affiliates contributed to this report: KSHB of Kansas City, Mo.; KTIV of Sioux City, Iowa; KWWL of Waterloo, Iowa; WFIE of Evansville, Ind.; WNDU of South Bend, Ind.; WTMJ of Milwaukee; and WTHR of Indianapolis.
Jennifer Dunlap, a spokeswoman for Indiana Health Department, said it would also take only a small cut or scratch to expose someone to tetanus, an acute, often fatal, disease. Counties have been administering tetanus vaccinations and handing out water testing kits across Indiana and other Midwestern states.
The raging waters also seeped into countless wells, affecting drinking water for thousands of homes and businesses across the region.
The Studio Café in downtown Thiensville, Wis., was forced to shut its doors permanently because its well water tested positive for E. coli.
“They put a boil advisory on us, and since we are a coffee shop, we use a lot of water here,” said owner Julie Burton. “For the customers’ health, we couldn’t justify being open, so we had to close.”
