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Montezuma County Resident Contracts Hantavirus

Charles Rondeau
/
Creative Commons

Montezuma County Public Health officials are reminding people to beware of hantavirus exposure after a county resident contracted the potentially deadly respiratory illness in July. An epidemiologist with the health department, Lauri Wood, says the resident has fully recovered from the disease, which is primarily spread by deer mice. The case is one of four confirmed in Colorado this year. People typically contract hantavirus while cleaning out rodent-infested structures and breathing in dirt and dust contaminated with deer mouse urine and droppings. In 2015, a 36-year-old Hesperus man who had been cleaning a shed died of the illness. Deer mice are larger than house mice and have white undersides.

Gail Binkly is a career journalist who has worked for the Colorado Springs Gazette and Cortez Journal, and was the editor of the Four Corners Free Press, based in Cortez.
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