HINDS COUNTY, MS (Mississippi News Now) -
Despite the worst outbreak ever of the deadly West Nile virus in Mississippi, the state's largest county, Hinds, is not spraying for mosquitoes.
There have been a total of 202 cases of West Nile in Mississippi in 2012, producing a total of five deaths. Hinds County has had 23 cases, but no deaths since 2008.
There was a time when it was a common sight to see mosquito spraying trucks in Hinds County. The county once paid up to $181,000 a year for the spraying, but it hasn't happened since 2009. The provider decided, for personal reasons, he did not want to provide the service anymore.
Supervisor Phil Fisher is irate that the service is no longer offered.
"My thoughts on how to do it have not gained any traction with the board, and no one else has made a motion to come up with another way, so this is where we are."
Supervisor Kenneth Stokes is more outspoken than Fisher about the lack of mosquito spraying.
"But now a mosquito bite is death. And you can't take a chance of someone losing their life because the county failed to spray for mosquitoes."
Board president, supervisor Robert Graham, points out that spraying for mosquitoes is taking place inside the cities in the county.
"The City of Jackson does its own spraying, the City of Clinton, the City of Byram, so the majority of the county is already being sprayed for mosquitoes."
Jackson sprays from April to October. Graham points out that it will be up to the five member board to vote to spray again. And we know that three of the five members of the board of supervisors want the county spraying again.
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