The mortgage crisis and disease

Our world is interconnected in surprising and often hazardous ways. Birds, mosquitoes, viruses, cultural artifacts (swimming pools), climate (drought), urban landscape, adjustable rate mortgages, government regulation. What a tangled web we weave.

Consider the current mortgage crisis in the US:

Foreclosures are increasing West Nile virus dangers because of stagnant swimming pools behind abandoned homes.

The foul pools are breeding grounds for mosquitoes, which can pass West Nile to humans and horses. The spike in mosquitoes comes earlier than the usual summertime appearance of the pest.

The Greater Los Angeles County Vector Control District got 288 service requests last month, nearly double the 145 in May 2007. Agency spokeswoman Truc Dever says "all of the evidence is pointing to a very active West Nile season." (AP)

Adjustable rate mortgages and West Nile Virus infection

By examining service requests and using aerial surveys researchers from University of California - Davis and in the Kern County Vector Control District (KCVCD) discovered an extensive number of green or neglected pools that were producing mosquitoes:

The likely reasons for neglected pools are the adjustable rate mortgage and associated housing crises in Kern County and throughout California, which have led to increased house sales, notices of delinquency of payment, declarations of bankruptcy and home abandonment. Kern County was especially affected, with a 300% increase in notice of delinquency than in the spring quarters of 2006-2007. Associated with home abandonment was the expanding number of neglected swimming pools, Jacuzzis (hot tubs), and ornamental ponds. As chemicals deteriorated, invasive algal blooms created green swimming pools that were exploited rapidly by urban mosquitoes, thereby establishing a myriad of larval habitats within suburban neighborhoods that were difficult to locate from the ground.

As the crash progresses, you can anticipate malaria and other diseases that formerly plagued Americans to recur with increased frequency.