Get Ready to Be Covered In Poison, Brooklyn!
Did you know that we’re in the middle of one of the largest West Nile virus outbreaks of ALL TIME? We’re making history, people. History! Everyone loves history.
Major mosquito spraying is due to start over large swaths of Brooklyn including the neighborhoods of Canarsie, East Flatbush, Flatlands, Georgetown, Marine Park, Mills Basin, Mills Island, Spring Creek, Starrett City and Georgetown. And the spraying starts tonight! So feel forewarned. Not, like, MUCH forewarned, but forewarned nonetheless.
NBC reports that the Center for Disease Control is predicting that this will be the worst season for West Nile virus since the disease first came to America in 1999. Reportedly, “they think the mild winter, early spring and very hot summer have fostered breeding of mosquitoes that pick up the virus from birds they bite and then spread it to people.”
As serious as something like West Nile virus sounds though, we prefer to be rational about this and take comfort in the fact that “only about one in five infected people get sick. One in 150 infected people will develop severe symptoms including neck stiffness, disorientation, coma and paralysis.”
I mean, yes, our chances of succumbing to neck stiffness are much better than our chances of winning the lottery, but I’m willing to take those chances if it means I don’t have to walk around draping myself in mosquito netting as if I was was George Costanza and mosquito netting was velvet.
Anyway, if you live in one of the areas being sprayed, the NYC Dept of Health warns that you don’t go outside because POISON.
Follow Kristin Iversen on twitter @kmiversen
