Sentinel Chickens
Chickens play a big role in Mosquito Control's function to monitor for mosquito-borne viruses called arbovirus, which could be transmitted to people from the bite of an infected mosquito. At Orange County Mosquito Control, these chickens are known as Sentinel Chickens, and they serve a vital role in helping to protect both residents and visitors of the county by monitoring for arboviruses that could be transmitted to people from the bite of a mosquito. The Sentinel Chicken program is a statewide arbovirus monitoring program done in partnership between the Florida Department of Health and local mosquito control programs like Orange County Mosquito Control.
Orange County Mosquito Control maintains several Sentinel Chicken coops strategically located throughout Orange County. Samples are collected on a weekly basis throughout the year from these coops and sent to the Florida Department of Health for testing for the presence of various arboviruses like West Nile Virus, Eastern Equine Encephalitis Virus, St. Louis Encephalitis Virus, and Highlands J Virus.
The reason Sentinel Chickens are used for this process is because chickens are a "dead-end host," in that they do not replicate enough arbovirus in their bloodstream to become a public health threat, and they do not succumb to the infection. Once a Sentinel Chicken tests positive, the virus can be detected but does not spread beyond that point. The chicken is then retired from the program and sent to a local farm where it lives out the rest of its life with other chickens.
If any test results show the presence, or antibodies of an arbovirus, then the results alert Mosquito Control that an arbovirus is circulating within Orange County's mosquito population. The Mosquito Control team will respond to this increased threat by increasing control measures in at-risk areas in the county in order to help lower the number of mosquitoes, which could spread arbovirus. The Sentinel Chickens serve a vital role in helping the Mosquito Control team monitor for mosquito-borne diseases and lower the risk of arbovirus transmission to people and animals within Orange County.