South Dakota Ag Connection - Health Department Awards $500,000 for Mosquito Control

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Health Department Awards $500,000 for Mosquito Control
South Dakota Ag Connection - 06/29/2016

More than 200 South Dakota cities, counties and tribes will share in $499,854 in grants intended to control mosquitoes and prevent West Nile virus (WNV), the Department of Health announced today.

All applying communities received funding, with grants ranging from $450 to $20,000. Grant awards were based on the population of the applying jurisdiction and its history of human WNV cases through 2015.

Since the state's first human case in 2002, South Dakota has reported 2,208 cases, including 696 hospitalizations and 32 deaths. Every county has reported cases. This season South Dakota reported its first human WNV case, a Minnehaha County resident, on June 24.

Including this latest round of grants, the state has provided local mosquito control programs with more than $6.5 million in support, in either direct grant funding or control chemicals, since the virus emerged in South Dakota.

See westnile.sd.gov for prevention information and surveillance updates. Preventing and controlling infectious disease is one objective of the Department of Health's 2015-2020 strategic plan, doh.sd.gov/strategicplan.

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