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State Health Officials Urge Rural Residents to Avoid Hantavirus IGNACIO, CO (ksut) - Colorado Health officials are urging residents in rural parts of the state to avoid exposure to hantavirus. State epidemiologist John Pape says people should be particularly alert for mouse droppings and other evidence of mice in and around buildings and wood piles.

A significant increase in the number of deer mice infected with hantavirus was discovered recently In a survey at the San Juan Basin Research Center near Hesperus. About 36 percent of mice caught tested positive for the disease, which can cause severe respiratory problems in humans. Special study sites are in place in Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and other western states.

Drought conditions kept the number of mice low last year. Colorado State University immunology professor Charles Calisher says this year is similar to 1999, when 40 percent of deer mice tested positive and several people became ill. People can contract the disease when they breathe dust contaminated by an infected rodent's urine, feces or saliva. Of those infected with hantavirus, about 40 percent die.
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