With the holiday and travel season upon us, Arizonans are encouraged to continue to rebel against arboviruses like chikungunya, dengue, and Zika. Whether you are traveling to a galaxy far, far away or to lands much closer to home, we encourage you to “Fight the Bite” and support resistance efforts. If you have a bad [...]
The month of October is high mosquito season in Sonora, Mexico and there have been reports of local transmission of dengue and Zika viruses. With the upcoming three-day weekend and many schools on fall break over the next several weeks, it’s important to remind Arizonans about increased mosquito activity in Sonora in the event they [...]
This week Governor Doug Ducey issued a proclamation for Arizona Blood Donation Week highlighting the importance of donating blood to save people’s lives. Back in 1969, an article titled "The Blood Bank as a Public Health Service" described blood donation as an altruistic service: one human helping another. The article suggested that benefits might extend to [...]
The Arizona Department of Health Services, Maricopa County Department of Public Health, and the University of Arizona will kick-off the second Great Arizona Mosquito Hunt this week. The Great Arizona Mosquito Hunt began as a collaborative project in 2015 to teach high school students about mosquito biology and emerging mosquito-borne diseases, such as dengue, chikungunya, [...]
Last week we hosted a two-day workshop on improving surveillance capacity for diseases spread by mosquitoes with the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and the International Society of Disease Surveillance (ISDS). ISDS's mission of bringing ideas to actions with measurable impact on public health practice, helped our Office of Infectious Disease Services to develop new ways to better inform our response [...]
As expected, the first case of Zika has finally been confirmed in Arizona. Yesterday, our Arizona State Public Health Laboratory identified Zika virus in a specimen sent to us for testing. The case, an older adult woman in Maricopa County, was infected with the disease while traveling in a country with known Zika virus transmission. [...]
If you’ve been following the news lately, you’ve noticed a lot of attention on Zika virus, an emerging mosquito-borne disease that’s spreading across the Americas. As of today, no cases of Zika have been found in Arizona, but several other U.S. states are reporting cases of Zika virus in travelers returning from countries where the [...]
Every day our staff works with local public health and healthcare partners to prepare for and respond to all kinds of public health threats. Looking back at 2015, we addressed infectious disease threats like Ebola, measles, chikungunya, and Salmonella; environmental threats like wildfires, monsoons, and floods; and potential health security threats at Superbowl XLIX. This work [...]
Dengue and chikungunya are two mosquito-borne viruses that Arizonans can contract when traveling outside the country. If a mosquito in Arizona bites an infected person during their illness, it would be possible for the virus to start spreading in the state. To prevent this from happening, it is important for public health to identify suspected [...]
Our vector-borne disease team is partnering with the University of Arizona, Maricopa County Department of Public Health, and other local health departments in a project with high schools around the state to learn more about the Aedes aegypti mosquito. This mosquito was introduced to Arizona in the past 20 years and can transmit dengue and [...]
