SAVANNAH — Professional mosquito killers are a little puzzling on this thing about the Zika virus.
They are kind of laid back about it, at least compared to some members of the public.
It’s not like this is their first disease rodeo. They did West Nile, dengue, chikungunya and encephalitis. And there are always worries that more lurk in the nation’s future, like Rift Valley Fever from Africa.
So many seem surprised that this Zika thing seems different. It has captured the public's attention and fears in a way that's new for people I talked to in the mosquito business.
Nearly 900 pros swarmed Savannah for the annual national convention of the American Mosquito Control Association. They heard the latest in ways to research, sterilize, repel, dispossess and generally obliterate their nemesis. They know they have some measure of job security, since no matter what the pros do, mosquitoes might die, but they never fade away.
I heard jokes about mosquito sex. (It really is funky.) I saw the t-shirts ("Are you a blood donor?") Heard how mosquitoes outlasted the dinosaurs. Listened to a few talk about how the chikungunya virus should be scarier than Zika is.
All the talk of mosquitoes had me fighting the urge to swat the air and brush away the buzzing I imagined near my ears.
Researchers, chemical salespeople, government mosquito control folks and even spray truck operators at the event have made a career out of being mean to mosquitoes. They have lots of tricks.
Make their babies stop developing. Attack their nervous systems. Get them to have sex with sterile males. Bait them with sugar from dates but lace it with garlic that tears up their guts. Spread granules in water. Spray death from the air. Employ flying drones. One outfit announced it has come up with a way to disperse swarms of sterile, non-biting males from planes in a way that keeps them from being torn apart in the process, which apparently was a big issue.
Touching a nerve
Zika touches a nerve because it hits our most precious future. It isn’t scary for what it does to most people — which apparently is not much — but for the risk it seems to pose to unborn children. Scientists suspect pregnant women are passing the virus on to babies who are born with with microcephaly, a condition characterized by a small head and incomplete brain development. The virus has spread around parts of South and Central America, creating fear and upending travel plans for some Americans who planned to visit places now seen as Zika-infected.
Public health fears have a way of affecting business. Zika could be bad for the cruise and travel industry in those parts of the world.
I assumed it also would drum up business for people in the mosquito business, from repellent makers to mosquito control companies and government agencies. USA Today reported recently how some repellent makers are prepping to boost supplies.
Patrick Prather, who owns a pest control business as well as a mosquito control outfit called Municipal Mosquito that serves governments in north Texas, told me he’s been fielding lots of calls from worried clients.
“It is bordering on irrational,” he told me.
Mosquitoes are dormant in his area now, he said. So it’s too early to start killing them.
Gabi Sakolskey, an assistant superintendent with the government-run Cape Cod Mosquito Control, told me she has spent the last 23 years killing mosquitoes. Still, she sounded amazed that Zika fears have people calling her office for advice at this time of the year, even as her Massachusetts community is shoveling snow.
“It should not be a problem for us at all,” Sakolskey said of Zika.
Part of her reasoning is that the two types of mosquitoes indicted for carrying Zika aren’t in her area, she said. (There are more than 3,000 kinds of mosquitoes.) In fact, much of the nation, particular in the west and the north, isn’t prime ground for the suspect mosquitoes.
But at least one of the two is common in Georgia.
Limiting the spread
Air conditioning and screens on windows should limit the spread of Zika, mosquito control experts say. Or, I should say, “hope.”
So far, though, most business and government officials I spoke with said while they are fielding lots of Zika questions, they haven’t seen lots of new orders and they aren’t entirely sure there will be a big pick-up in business.
During one convention session I attended, audience members twice announced fresh news to the crowd. One was an increased warning level from the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control. The other was President Obama's proposal for $1.8 billion in funding tied to Zika and mosquito control.
As I walked out of the session I heard one attendee sum it up: “Job security.”
Shouldn’t all this boost not only calls but paying business for mosquito killers in the U.S.?
Maybe, said Stanton Cope, who directs entomology and regulatory services for pest control company Terminix. “It’s too early in the season to tell.”
He’s been coming to mosquito control conventions for years. There’s always another disease lurking.
“A lot of us,” he said, “think there’s overreacting to most of these things.”
“This group doesn’t freak out because they all understand this stuff,” he assured me.
Man, I hope he is right.
