West Nile Virus Is Back In Oklahoma This Year

I don't know who is playing a round of Jumanji, but it's about time to wrap it up. Amid a global pandemic with coronavirus, murder hornets, meth gators, and social unrest, we officially have West Nile Virus back in the Sooner State.

Oklahoma City & County epidemiologists have confirmed mosquitoes that carry West Nile are back, at least in Oklahoma City. Other parts of the state are to be tested and surveyed next. If you're wonder how they do this, they put out traps to capture the mosquitoes, then painstakingly test their blood through normal everyday blood work. While we haven't seen West Nile in the state for a number of years, why wouldn't it return in 2020? It's icing on the cake.

Officials do stress that just because they've confirmed mosquitoes carrying the disease are here, they still haven't confirmed a single case of West Nile in the population, yet.

That's pretty much the gist of the news article I ran across, but that's not the full story. You see, the media at every level looks to sensationalize the facts. I'd call it "scare tactics," but every time I call it for what it is, my boss get letters from media companies in the area asking me to refrain from it. Apparently the truth just isn't selling like it used to.

The rest of the story...

What you're not seeing in the news is 47 other states confirmed not only having mosquitoes that tested positive for West Nile last year, but all 47 of them saw cases in humans throughout 2019. Did it make headlines? Of course not, but pandemic is the flavor of the year now, so I'm sure you'll hear it within days.

If you want to stay on top of this stuff, go straight to the source instead of letting someone else tell you how afraid to be. Start at the CDC website. Please note, the map doesn't yet show Oklahoma as having confirmed West Nile activity, but it's also two weeks behind, and confirmation came Monday.