YAKIMA, Wash--The Yakima Health District wants the community to be vigilant when it come to preventing mosquitoe breading grounds and also take steps to avoid mosquitoe bites.
The Benton County mosquito control district found mosquitos with West Nile virus yesterday afternoon. The 50 mosquitos were then trapped. The virus is the first known sample this year in Washington state. Nationwide there were 124 West Nile deaths last year, but none in Washington.
"It's not anything that we don't expect. Really we know that we have West Nile in the valley. What's different about this is it was found earlier than we see in the season," said Laura Charters, enviromental health specialist.
Usually West Nile is found in August and September. This means that people need to be careful about mosquitoe prevention earlier in the summer this year.
West Nile symptoms range from headaches to backaches and low grade fevers. Only one in five people will show symptoms. The health district askes that people make sure they don't have standing water on their property.
