Mosquito Spraying Protested

[Guest guest]

Residents debate mosquitoes, pesticide

Aggressive spraying brings out crowd in Paonia area

By Lofholm

Denver Post Staff Writer

http://www.denverpost.com/search/ci_5256698

Delta - Fogging trucks sit idle in the Paonia/Hotchkiss Mosquito

Control District garage. The first mosquitoes are more than a month

from hatching. But the buzz already is growing loud in the North Fork

Valley.

This agricultural-rich area posted the highest per-capita numbers in

the state for mosquito-borne West Nile virus last year in spite of

aggressive and controversial spraying of pesticides since 1985.

To some residents and officials, that means it's time to do things

differently.

More than 70 people, including at least one victim of West Nile

virus, crammed a Delta County Courthouse meeting room last week to

lobby for a better way of fighting the bite.

" This is a health problem. We need professional help, " said retired

rancher Rosemary Bilchak. " We are in a position where we are poisoned

on a weekly basis. "

Bilchak and others opposed to the seasonal fogging of Paonia and

Hotchkiss with the toxic pesticide malathion point to the numbers:

The odds of contracting West Nile virus are one in 113 for Hotchkiss

and Paonia residents. That compares with one in 3,417 for Mesa

County, one in 6,800 for Larimer County and one in 3,430 for Weld

County.

They said they believe the Monday-night foggings are contributing to

that rate by creating resistant mosquitoes and weakened human immune

systems.

State and county health officials don't subscribe to that theory:

They point to unusually wet weather last summer. But they don't

sanction the rite of summer fogging.

" I would really like to see an integrated countywide program, " said

Ken Nordstrom, director of environmental health for the Delta County

Health Department. " But getting to that place will be very

challenging politically. "

That was illustrated at the Mosquito Forum. It lasted nearly three

hours, and questions still were being shouted as the meeting stopped.

Delta County Commissioners Jan McCracken and Olen Lund sat silent in

the back row even when attendees begged them to take a stand. Three

mosquito control board members in the front row also were silent. A

deputy was posted in a hallway - a reminder that this issue has led

to violence. The mosquito control building was damaged by a bomb in

2003.

Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment epidemiologist

Pape said he would prefer Delta County do less spraying. He

suggested an integrated mosquito management program that would focus

on changing human behaviors to avoid mosquitoes, eliminating standing

water and other mosquito breeding grounds and using larvicide to kill

insects before they hatch. Spraying pesticides to kill adult

mosquitoes would be a last resort.

But mosquito district director Bill Kolb said after the meeting that

the fogging will continue.

" The majority wish for that to be done, " he said.

The district won't use malathion this summer and is working with the

Colorado Department of Agriculture to come up with alternative

chemicals. Kolb said the district will continue to use larvicides.

Soule, a Hotchkiss biologist who survived West Nile virus,

said the consequences will go beyond health issues and political

stalemates.

" We have a serious problem, " he said. " And it is going to become a

serious economic crisis. People are going to stop coming here. "

Staff writer Lofholm can be reached at 970-256-1957 or

nlofholm@....

--

Even the state health officials don't want routine spraying, which is

a pleasant surprise.

Carl Grimes

Healthy Habitats LLC