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CNN Sunday Morning

West Nile Spreads Along East Coast

Aired July 29, 2001 - 07:06   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.
VINCE CELLUNI, CNN ANCHOR: The Centers For Disease Control is urging communities to step up programs to eradicate mosquitoes that carry the virus and the advice is use insect repellent and get rid of any standing water where mosquitoes breed.

As West Nile spreads along the East Coast, CNN medical correspondent Ria Blakey takes a look at new diseases and the concern they pose in the jet age.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

REA BLAKEY, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Disease carrying microbes travel quickly around the globe because people do, potentially exposing more of us to disease.

VOLMINK: These diseases are simply taken around the world at lightening speed.

BLAKEY: In February, health officials were baffled by a patient, who after traveling from Africa, arrived in Hamilton, Canada with Ebola like symptoms. The patient survived. The disease remains unidentified. And as more people travel to areas with a high disease risk, the threat is multiplying. Forty percent of people in the world live in areas where there is a risk of malaria. The World Health Organization estimates as many as 500 million cases occur each year, resulting in more than one million deaths.

VOLMINK: We have already seen an increase in the incidents of the diseases. And that trend will continue.

BLAKEY: Tuberculosis disease, once the leading cause of death in the U.S., kills two million people worldwide each year. If global TB control is not strengthened, the World Health Organization estimates nearly one billion people will be newly infected within the next 20 years. That could result in an estimated 35 million deaths.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These are two diseases that are treatable and in many cases preventable.

BLAKEY: Six months worth of medication to fight, TB cost $20 per patient. A bed net treated with insecticides to prevent malaria costs $10. Yet, many countries cannot afford these simple items.

VOLMINK: In many of these countries, you're not dealing with a single disease, you're dealing with many diseases simultaneously and resources have to be found to cope with those.

BLAKEY (on-camera): In an increasingly global society, there are new opportunities for trade and travel. But with those opportunities come threats in the form of greater exposure to infectious diseases.

Rea Blakey, CNN, Washington.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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