Flea Borne Typhus on Rise Again

A little history of Typhus in Orange County Ca.
Health officials in Orange County California are not sure how the latest outbreak of Typhus started in Orange County. But what we do know is that they are trapping feral cats in the North Orange County area and checking their fleas for this disease. You see, this disease is carried by the fleas these animals have. With the explosion of feral cats in Orange County they figure they may be the main carrier of those infected fleas.
According to Nicole Stanfield, the spokesperson for the county health department, typhus was once a rare occurrence in Orange County but they have seen a steady increase of typhus cases over the past 6 years. Nicole said, “In 2006 we started seeing an increase in these cases, and every year since then the number of cases has gone up”.
So how did this disease even get to Orange County? Typhus is carried buy fleas, the cat flea specifically. Any mammal can carrier this flea but rats are the main host. When other critters move around in those areas with that flea, the fleas jump on them for another blood meal, thus spreading the disease to their population. Opossums, cats, raccoons and skunks can also harbor this flea but according to Joe Ramirez, Health Specialist with the Vector Borne Disease Surveillance Unit in LA, Says,” Rats, Feral Cats and Opossums are the main spreaders of this flea”.
Here are some interesting facts. Until the late 1900’s there was no reported cases of flea-borne typhus outside of the Port of Los Angeles. But when an outbreak of this disease accorded, the county health officials determine that the fleas causing this problem were being carried by opossums. They immediately started a trapping of opossums and euphemizing them at the county animal control offices. The possum’s lovers of Los Angeles flipped out when they heard about this program. They brought pressure on Los Aneles County to stop this program plus they started their own trapping program. Problem was they wanted a trap and release program these animals. They trapped and relocated 1000’s of these opossums. Where did the release them?
They began to release the opossums in the foothills above Pasadena, the Mt. Washington area and in the Long Beach area. They also used North Orange County area for their release program, specially the wetland areas near Huntington Beach.
You guessed it, several years later typhus cases started showing up in all those areas. In Orange County, Huntington Beach has the highest numbers of typhus case being report to the state health department.
Wheeler’s Pest Control carries a State Trapping License. It you have a problem with feral animals on you property just give us a call. We’d be glade to clear your property of unwanted feral animals.