Editorial from Newsday:

Use Common Sense in Spraying for West Nile Virus

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Use Common Sense in Spraying for West Nile Virus

Last year, mosquito-borne West Nile virus killed seven people in the metropolitan region and made more than 60 seriously ill. At that time, local governments used pesticides to bring the epidemic under control,chemicals that aggravated allergies in some and asthma in others. Babies and the elderly suffered in particular,but most folks correctly reasoned that the spraying served a greater public good.

If only the professional environmentalists possessed a similar walking-around sense.

This year the West Nile virus is back. And as New York City uncorked a pesticide called Anvil last week, an outfit called the No-Spray Coalition took it to court. For one thing, said a No Spray lawyer, the four deaths within the city last year don't add up to an epidemic. More people died from flu and car accidents, he said.

How asinine can you get? Just imagine if Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and other regional leaders had used that argument last year as the death toll rose around them. They would have been run out of office on a rail.

U.S. District Court Judge Harold Baer wasn't buying it, thank goodness. He refused on Wednesday to issue a temporary order against the spraying.

Meanwhile, the city's Health Department told the court that it is using Anvil in "ultra-low volume" and that its application poses no general health risks.

The real question isn't why New York City, Suffolk County and other jurisdictions in the region have chosen to spray. The real question is why Nassau County has decided not to.

So far it has discovered three birds infected with the virus -but no mosquitoes. Giuliani claims Nassau's inaction puts the city at risk. Nassau says its aggressive mosquito-control program may preclude the need for pesticides. Right now, the matter is a judgment call. But it's hard to believe that the county will not find infected mosquitoes before summer is out. Nassau should be prepared to break out the pesticides (as it did last year) on a moment's notice. Until then, keep your fingers crossed.

Original Story:  http://www.newsday.com/coverage/current/editorial/friday/nd4662.htm

(Editor's Note:  Please re-read what happened in New Jersey because a city sprayed "just in case" then re-think what this Editorial Opinion means to you and your family.  These "antedoctal" documentation is what normal citizens deal with while being poisoned.  A few weeks or years later as illness rise... there is no absolute place to point the cause.  Then we have cancers of unknown origins. )

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