St. Louis Encephalitis Virus Strikes in Stanislaus County

     St. Louis Encephalitis Virus (SLEV) , a Flavivirus spread by Culex genus mosquitos was once a common disease in many bird populations across the United States. This disease occasionally spilled over into human populations and interesting infected people of different ages with drastically different syndromes. While the majority of cases are asymptomatic forty percent of children infected with SLEV developed only a fever and headache while over 90% of elderly patients infected developed acute meningitis and encephalitis which occasionally progressed to death.
    SLEV was much more prevalent in the US in the 1970s and 80s. In `1975 there were over 2,000 cases in humans across the country, but by the 1990s it had vanished from many parts of the US and was not detected anywhere in California for over 30 years.
     However, the disease has recently made a comeback. It reemerged in California in 2016 and this year has been detected in birds in 14 out of the 51 counties in the state.   Today marks a fateful day in the return of SLEV to California in that the disease has claimed the life of its first victim in the State. The Stanislaus Health Department confirmed that a patient who contracted the disease in September has died as a result of his symptoms. He was in his 70's. 
     Only time will tell if if this rebirth of SLEV is a temporary outbreak or if will continue to rise in the US due to warmers temperatures.

- Chris LeBoa

For more Information:
http://www.turlockjournal.com/section/12/article/35530/
https://www.cdc.gov/sle/technical/epi.html