Did climate change cause this year's early West Nile Virus outbreak?
Climate change is likely the culprit for mosquitoes arriving earlier, as warming temperatures were seen to impact diseases transmitted by mosquitoes in other places.
A Culex quinquefasciatus mosquito is seen on the skin of a human host in this 2014 picture from the Center for Disease Control. C. quinquefasciatus is known as one of the many arthropodal vectors responsible for spreading the arboviral encephalitis, West Nile virus (WNV) to human beings through the(photo credit: REUTERS/CDC/JAMES GATHANY)ByMAAYAN JAFFE-HOFFMAN