Insect illnesses on the move

Almost daily headlines about the spread of rare, potentially deadly insect-borne diseases such as eastern equine encephalitis (EEE) and Oropouche fever highlight the expanding threat that mosquitoes,

1 big thing: Insect illnesses on the move

Almost daily headlines about the spread of rare, potentially deadly insect-borne diseases such as eastern equine encephalitis (EEE) and Oropouche fever highlight the expanding threat that mosquitoes, ticks and other bugs present, Axios' Tina Reed and I write.

Why it matters: Longer, hotter summers, milder winters and changes in land use and travel are giving insects more time and space to spread diseases or compound the misery in places where they already exist.

Driving the news: The death of a New Hampshire resident from EEE brought home the threat.

The CDC has also warned this summer about an increased risk of dengue fever, which is spread by the same type of mosquitoes that carry the Zika virus and chikungunya.

West Nile virus has become a perennial threat throughout much of the continental U.S.

Malaria, a parasite spread by another species of mosquito, is also on the rise around the world, and several cases were reported in the U.S. last year, though the risk of catching it here remains low.

Zoom in: In the U.S., experts say the environment for insects in the northern half of the country has become far more hospitable because of rising temperatures.

Global warming is "changing where mosquitoes and ticks live, and thus what diseases are moving around in different regions," CDC director Mandy Cohen said yesterday.

Yes, but: More travel and globalization also fuel the spread of vector-borne diseases, said Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy.

For example, researchers believe Oropouche fever, which is spread by mosquitoes and midges, was brought to the U.S. and Europe by travelers who had been to Cuba and South America. Officials do not have evidence of local transmission in the U.S.

Changes in land use also play a role. Lyme disease is believed to be spreading in North America, in large part, due to the suppression of wildfires, which has allowed for the maturation of forests and animals that allow ticks to thrive.

Between the lines: "We're putting out more fires, and it takes more to put them out," says Colin Carlson of the Yale School of Public Health.

The rise in malaria in Africa and dengue fever in Asia and the Americas has been linked to global warming, but it's harder to attribute individual outbreaks or rare diseases to climate change, in part because of limited data, he said.

"It's also important to remember that explosive epidemics of arboviruses are standard fare," says Carlson, who studies whether changes in certain diseases can be linked to climate change. It happened with Zika and chikungunya in the Americas.

"With both Oropouche and EEE, I think it's important to not jump the gun and immediately go to, well, this is climate change in practice," Carlson says.

The intrigue: Some mosquito species are migrating around the world — presumably being transported on shipping routes, says Sadie Ryan, a medical geographer at the University of Florida.

One concern is a mosquito species could be deposited in a habitat that suits them and has "blood meals running around on the streets," Ryan said. If there's a disease there, the new species could pick it up and become part of the transmission cycle, she says.

"These are new paradigms," she adds. There's natural invasion biology happening at the same time as transformations in the landscape and climate change.

What to watch: Insect immunology could offer new avenues for fighting the diseases and is beginning to mature as a field, says microbiologist and National Science Foundation program director Joanna Shisler.

By studying how a virus replicates in a mosquito and how the insect's immune system fights it, scientists may be able to understand why some mosquitoes are resistant while others are susceptible to different types of virus infections, Shisler says.

Axios

Me: Find an electric cattle restraining fence and touch the live wire with both hands several times - the electric surge will flow through your body killing off all blood borne diseases in the one second or so that it takes to do that. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Don’t do if you have a bad heart or you have a Pacemaker