BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — A Louisiana parish is getting a $605,000 federal grant to shred old tires that hold standing water and breed mosquitoes that spread disease.
Louisiana's health department says it secured the grant from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to give to the East Baton Rouge Parish mosquito control district.
The money will buy a tire shredder.
The health department says tires are strong breeding sites for mosquitoes that can transmit West Nile, Zika and dengue.
Kyle Moppert, the department's public health entomologist, says water warms in the tire, creating an ideal habitat for mosquito larvae. He says one tire can become "a mosquito condominium."
East Baton Rouge Parish's mosquito control agency has mapped 109 piles of used tires throughout the parish and also will work with other parishes.