Return to Transcripts main page
American Morning
West Nile Virus is Spreading Beyond East Coast
Aired August 02, 2001 - 11:38 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DONNA KELLEY, CNN ANCHOR: The West Nile virus is spreading beyond the East Coast, surfacing for the first time in Ohio. Since 1999, the virus has killed nine people in New York and New Jersey. Last month, the first cases of the virus appeared in birds as far south as Florida. We've had a couple of them here in Georgia, now a dead bluejay puts Ohio on the list.
Joining us now is CNN medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
Dr. Gupta, how fearful people be? Should they be afraid and panic here?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, you know, talked to folks in the Centers for Disease Control. They are not surprised by this at all. This virus is spread by birds, and birds are going to fly all over the country, including further west. Ohio is the furthest west. But we wouldn't be surprised if it he continues to spread throughout country.
But to answer your question about panic, you know, still very few people will ever know that they even had the virus. CDS says around 1 percent of people know they may have it, never know it. There's a small percentage of people that actually get sick from it, but that's a small percentage.
KELLEY: OK, symptoms from somebody, if they do get bit by a mosquito who has this.
GUPTA: OK, when they actually get the symptoms, they're going to be sort of mild, flu-like symptoms for the most part -- fever, headache, nausea, maybe a little tiredness, things like that. There's a small percentage of people. Those are people usually older than 75, have heart disease, diabetes, other medical illness at risk for something called encephalitis; that's an inflammation of the brain. That can be deadly, but again, it's so rare, even if you do have the virus.
KELLEY: OK, so rare that it's deadly. Do you zip in and do you get antibiotics? Is that what you do to combat it?
GUPTA: There's no known antibiotic that treats this as of right now.
KELLEY: Because it is a virus, you can't do antibiotics with a virus.
GUPTA: Right, antibiotics are usually for bacteria, exactly. There are some centers working on vaccines potentially for this. Right now, the best treatment is prevention -- wear long sleeves at night, try and stay indoors dusk and dawn, using mosquito repellent with DT in it, and stay away from standing water, like water in swamps, or ponds, or water standing in gutters, things like that. That's where mosquitoes like to hang out and breed.
KELLEY: Yes. You know, we had a mosquito guy on this morning on one of our programs. He was showing us a number of the things that you can do to combat mosquitoes. Is this going to every state, do you think?
GUPTA: It very well could.
KELLEY: I mean, birds are all over.
GUPTA: Birds are all over. And again, the Centers for Disease Control, which is monitoring this, and had a lot of surveillance all around the country, wouldn't be surprised if it did.
But again, as you asked, the panic factor, the impact factor, may not be there. You could have it and may not even know you had it.
KELLEY: With flu-like symptoms, that can be a lot of things, but you better take it seriously just in case you feel like that.
GUPTA: Absolutely, prevention.
KELLEY: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thanks very much.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
