Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Wednesday, August 28, 2002
West Nile Death Toll Rises to 22 in US
Two additional deaths believed to have been caused by West Nile virus were reported Tuesday in Illinois in the United States, state health officials said.
Two additional deaths believed to have been caused by West Nile virus were reported Tuesday in Illinois in the United States, state health officials said.
If confirmed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the new cases would raise the West Nile death toll to 22 nationwide.
The latest Illinois fatalities were an 83-year-old Chicago man and a 92-year-old woman from suburban Chicago.
The CDC in Atlanta has confirmed 425 human cases of West Nile in 20 states and the District of Columbia, 20 of them fatal. It isthe country's worst outbreak this year since the mosquito-borne virus was first detected in New York in 1999.
The virus has done most of its damage this year in the south, especially Louisiana, where 171 human cases and eight deaths were reported.