And we don’t want them to. Stay tuned.

Download the Health Dept. announcement here: West Chester Spray 8-16-18

We keep having to point out that the phrase “to prevent West Nile Virus” in the press release title makes no sense. The West Nile virus is carried in birds, especially crows, and then is picked up by mosquitoes that bite the birds, and those same mosquitoes can then bite people. But the transmission chain to humans must be really weak, because this whole year PA has had only one possible identified human case, not definitely verified and not critical.

About this particular spray plan: Note from the maps below that the proposed spray area would include almost all of the S. half of the Borough and most of the NE (including Marshall Square Park, where the Borough fended off spraying 3 years ago).

The County Health Department’s press release says: “People who are concerned about exposure to mosquito control products can reduce their potential for exposure by staying indoors with children and pets when their neighborhood is being sprayed.” That is a very low-level warning. Of course, everyone ought to be concerned about any pesticide being directly sprayed on them or infiltrating their dwellings.

But how does that advice play out in an urban area like downtown West Chester? What will people here be doing on a Thursday eve, other than sitting at home with their children and pets?

Although spraying is not scheduled right on Market and Gay Streets, it would pass really close to them, and of course spray drifts. Are people enjoying their outside drink or dinner in the center of town going to have methoprene drifting onto them and their food and into their lungs? Is West Chester going to earn the reputation of a place to avoid patronizing?

If just one hypersensitive person dining outside or inadvertently walking through the spray area has a serious adverse reaction, or one small asthmatic child in tow has to be rushed to the ER, that is going to be big liability. For whom?

For the County, which does the spraying? (Let’s be clear: the County decides when to spray, not the State.) The restaurant owner who could be said to have the duty to close down outdoors for the evening? The Business Improvement District, unless it acts to get downtown closed off? The Borough, if it does not make the decision to close the parking garages and post warning signs? This is a real morass. It’s not like spraying a rural area where houses are 500 feet apart with long driveways.

How about West Chester University? The whole campus north of Rosedate is in the spray area. Are all the students going to be told to stay in their rooms from 8 p.m. till the next day? How about those coming back from an off-campus job or the Library?

The Health Department really has not thought this through. If they wanted to make a more reasonable case, they would be proposing to spray only in the immediate vicinity of what are apparently the 3 trap sites with high readings: College Ave at the pumping station, Green Field, and Magnolia St.

The Health Department releases its info selectively to make its own pro-spraying case. Where are the other 28 traps in the Borough? What are their readings? Why do they want to spray the NE but not the NW? It’s full of mysteries, and that’s the way they seem to want it. But we don’t. “Trust us” doesn’t work any more, and especially now that Chester County has become all too familiar with the PA DEP, which is the state resource on both pipelines and mosquitoes.

When Don’t Spray Me! filed a Right To Know request, the Health Department said it did not know where it larvicided in 2015-17; and they also say they don’t have time to tell us where they larvicided this year. They say they spray only “after exhausting all other available mosquito control strategies” and they don’t even know where they have larvicided, which is the most effective anti-mosquito treatment in known breeding sites like storm drains and stagnant bodies of water?

If the HD can’t do better to explain its actions and consider the effects on a complex urban population, it needs to be stopped until there is greater accountability in the interest of the public and the environment.

NE West Chester:

Southern half of West Chester: