Pasco County has declared a one-week local state of emergency to intensify mosquito control after two locally acquired dengue cases. Officials will brief the public Thursday on aerial and ground operations already underway.

The Florida Department of Health’s mid-September count showed 152 locally acquired dengue infections statewide. Hillsborough County accounted for 134 of them and confirmed one related death. Pinellas had seven cases. Pasco’s two cases remain a small share of the total, but county leaders chose not to wait.

Pasco mosquito-control crews had already sent aircraft and personnel into Hillsborough earlier this month to treat container-breeding mosquitoes before lab results piled up. Pilot Brian Gentry said the current effort is using a chemical application designed to reach standing water around homes. Entomologist Taylor Taylor said the goal was to hit populations before they expanded.

Dengue is a mosquito-borne virus that can cause high fever, severe body pain, and, in a second infection, a higher risk of serious illness. It is not routinely transmitted person to person. Health officials continue to tell residents to empty standing water, keep screens intact, and use repellent.

The local emergency lasts seven days and is meant to speed resources, not to signal a countywide crisis. Hillsborough remains the center of the 2026 cluster. Pasco is treating the threat as containable if breeding sites are reduced and spraying continues.

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