PESTILENCE WATCH:Virus carriers on the prowl in Colorado

Colorado's mosquitoes and ticks are in season, searching for blood.Deer mice are thriving across much of the state, gorging on plentiful vegetation following the first moist spring in several years.
And from viruses carried in bug bites and mouse droppings, a handful of people are getting very sick-and dying in what some experts fear could be a banner year for animal-and insect-borne diseases in Colorado."The creepy crawlies are out and about and we're seeing more exposure," said Donna McDonnall,Custer County's public-health nurse.McDonnall spent Wednesday driving around the Wet Mountains west of Colorado Springs,trying to figure out how an elderly Custer County man contracted the hantavirus infection that killed him earlier this month.The respiratory disease is carried in deer mice excrement.She's hosting a public meeting next week to tell local residents how to work and play outdoors safely during the months when people and disease-carrying critters interact.
"We'll cover hantavirus,West Nile,rabies and the plague-all the communicable diseases that are more prevalent in the summer and fall months when people are outside more,"McDonnall said.
The state health department sent out a statewide advisory Thursday,warning county health officials and other experts to be on the lookout for hantavirus,said state epidemiologist John Pape.So far,six people have contracted the respiratory disease in rural Colorado this summer, and four have died of it,Pape said."The fact that we've had four clustered in a couple-week period makes me concerned,"Pape said.
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