The more than $3.6 million that has been recently granted to the Indiana Department of Health by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to help control mosquito-borne illnesses will benefit research into other health issues in the state, health officials say.
The funding comes from several different channels. Of this, $2 million will be dispersed in increments of $400,000 over the next five years to fund programs and directors to oversee microcephaly tracking and mitigation efforts — this includes improvements to the Indiana Birth Defects and Problems Registry and nurses to work on cases of infants born with microcephaly, according to a news release.
An additional $1 million, from a CDC Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity grant, is dedicated to improving current mosquito surveillance in the state — looking for mosquito-borne infections in both humans and mosquitoes and upgrading laboratory capability.
The remaining $600,000 will be funneled into the state's public health emergency preparedness division.
Jennifer Brown, public health veterinarian for the Indiana State Department of Health, said in an interview that while the threat of Zika and its implications have been drivers in the funding, the resources will extend to protect from other illnesses — upgrading technology, equipment and adding staff, for instance.
“We continue to believe that the risk of widespread local transmission of Zika in the state of Indiana is low,” she said. “However, we do have other mosquito-borne diseases in our state ..and the great thing is that the things we need to do to be prepared for Zika are the same things we need to do to be prepared for other mosquito-borne diseases.”
Brown said she expects the same to apply to the Indiana Birth Defects and Problems Registry.
“The reason that the funding became available is to enhance our capacity to detect cases of microcephaly,” she said. “But of course, any improvements to the system will have a ripple effect and will benefit our surveillance efforts for other birth defects and conditions as well.”
ON THE LOCAL LEVEL
The Indiana State Department of Health is also in the process of allocating $100,000 to be spread among 27 counties that were approved for a public health preparedness grant, to help beef up local mosquito surveillance and control.
Clark County Health Department administrator Mike Meyer said the county is expecting to receive $2,978 from the upcoming grant award. The plan, he said, is to purchase a few backpack insecticide sprayers for more focused areas.
“If we get this in place in time, we will use them this year,” he said. “The normal mosquito season ends about October 15, after our first heavy frost. So if we get the money in September, we possibly could purchase them and use them yet this year.
“Hopefully within the next couple of weeks we'll have the green light to go ahead and spend it.”
A Sellersburg man recently tested positive for Zika after he contracted it from traveling. After the case was discovered lat last week, the Clark County Health Department began collecting batches of mosquitoes in Sellersburg to test for presence of either of the two species that can carry the virus, aedes albopictus and aedes aegypti, in the surrounding area.
Tom Harris, public health officer for the Floyd County Health Department, said he's in favor of anything that can be done to lessen mosquito populations, as long as it doesn't hurt beneficial insects in the area, like honeybees. This can be helped by selectively spraying.
“I would think it can only be helpful. We have cases of West Nile in Indiana every year,” he said. “It can be a bad infection, especially in elderly people.
“Anything that leads to mosquito control is generally a good thing from a public health perspective.”
WHAT'S NEXT?
Brown said that because the viruses between different mosquito-borne illnesses can behave very differently, it's hard to predict where the state is headed in terms of them.
“For a disease like West Nile, that's a disease that's maintained in nature,” she said. “When it was introduced into the United States, it found a home in our native bird population. For that reason, it will always be present from this point forward.
“The biology of the Zika virus is completely different. It's transmitted directly from person to person via infected mosquitoes and so the way Zika behaves is really dependent on those local mosquito populations and on human behavior on environmental conditions.”
This makes things less predictable, she said, but added that the U.S. climate doesn't lend itself to big outbreaks of mosquito-borne illnesses, like in more tropical areas.
“I can tell you the environmental conditions we have here in the U.S. are less favorable for long term ongoing local transmission than [other places where Zika transmission is happening],” she said.
“But in terms of what might happen over time or what might happen with the next virus, it's really hard to predict.”