Eastern equine encephalitis is a dangerous disease that is passed on to humans from infected mosquitoes.
It killed a man recently in New Hampshire, and the virus is here in Vermont, prompting the state health department to urge people living in towns including Alburgh, Burlington, Colchester and Swanton to stay indoors between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m.
The reason we know that EEE is here is because the Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets has a team that goes out to collect and test mosquitoes between June and October.
More from Vermont Public: What to know about the EEE warnings in Vermont, and how to stay safe
On a recent late morning, Patti Casey was holding what looked like a space-age ray gun for a low-budget science fiction movie.
It was about the size of a rifle, and she called it a “bug-zooka.”
It was made out of wide-mouth PVC tubing and wood stove hardware, with a motor inside, connected to a 12-volt battery, which Casey carried on her back, like a jet pack.
A nylon stocking was stretched across the end, which trapped the mosquitoes as Casey bent over to suck them out of 10 boxes, which were positioned near a swamp in Franklin County.
There are about 105 similar sites across the state. They also include light traps that draw the bugs in with dry ice and odor, which Casey says smells like a sweating ox.
Casey leads a team of six technicians who travel around with their own bug-zookas, vacuuming up mosquitoes, and then bringing them over to the Agency of Agriculture lab in Randolph.
The bugs are identified in the lab — they’ve looked at about 100,000 mosquitoes this summer — and then some of them are sent to the Department of Health lab, or to the federal Centers for Disease Control, where they’re tested for EEE and West Nile virus.
The whole process can take up to 10 days.
More from Vermont Edition: EEE and the mosquitoes that carry it
“Our program is really the sensing device, or tool, that the state has to determine if there is West Nile virus or Eastern equine encephalitis in the mosquito population, hopefully before it reaches the mammalian population. So humans and horses are the usual targets of EEE,” Casey said.
It’s up to the Vermont Department of Health to consider where the virus was found and what the threat is to human health.
So far, one man in the state, in Chittenden County, has been hospitalized with EEE, which can cause fever, chills and fatigue — and in the most extreme cases, cause inflammation of the brain, and possibly death.
Casey said even with all the time and resources that are put into vacuuming up live mosquitoes and testing thousands of them for disease, she can’t really tell you whether it’s safe to hang out in your backyard in the evening.
“It’s sort of the best we can do,” she said. “I mean mosquitoes are notoriously disrespectful of boundaries. You know they have very, very different flight range. So there’s a lot about this program that is very careful, very exact science. And there’s a lot of it that we can’t answer; we can’t be everywhere.”
The testing areas are generally set up near bodies of water, with concentrations along Lake Champlain.
As of the end of August, EEE had been detected in 66 pools along the Lake Champlain corridor.
Casey says most of time, the public is not really aware of the work she does.
She’s vacuuming up mosquitoes in some of the most pristine wetlands in the state, but the last month or so has been stressful, and busy.
The agency added what it calls 16 additional rapid response testing sites near where the virus was detected, and she says everyone involved with the program has been working overtime.
“Driving around in Vermont, going to beautiful wetlands, bird areas, seeing wilderness — you know, I love putting my boots on,” Casey said. “But this adds a level of stress because when we get into the point where we are concerned for public health, the pressure is on for us to get it right, as right as we possibly can.”
Casey says with the night cooling down, there is less mosquito activity.
But EEE is still around, and Casey says she will be out in the field, with her bug-zooka, vacuuming up mosquitoes right up until the first hard frost, probably some time in October.
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