Efforts are ramping up in Spanish Fort on spraying for mosquitos and attempting to identify the species of the insect that is in the area after startling revelations about two cases of a rare mosquito-borne virus.

One of the cases of Eastern Equine Encephalitis (EEE) is to blame for the death of a 7-year-old girl.

Spanish Fort Mayor Mike McMillan said Tuesday that the Spanish Fort City Council, during its meeting Monday night, voted on a contract with Arkansas-based VDCI Mosquito Management to survey the area, and to apply different kinds of sprays aimed at killing different species of mosquitos.

He said efforts are also ongoing in trapping and identifying the species of mosquitos within the community.

“They have the capability to do different sprays once you know the species we are dealing with,” McMillan told AL.com. “We are sort of in the dark until we know the species to direct a particular spray at. In the meantime, we are spraying every day until we get to the bottom of this.”

McMillan said the city routinely sprays for mosquitos, “every week and every mile in the city.” But he said that the city does not spray “more than once a week” out of concern of the insects building up immunity, which “defeats the purpose,” the mayor said.

He said the contract with VDCI allows the city to “go to an outside service with the capability to spray different kinds of sprays on a given notice.”

“They will be collecting the traps today to determine the species and best way to approach it,” McMillan said. “They have to do their analysis and how long that takes, I don’t know.”

A representative at VDCI could not be reached for immediate comment Tuesday morning.

McMillan said the city first found out about the EEE cases on Friday when city officials were alerted by the Baldwin County Board of Health. The Alabama Department of Public Health, which oversees the county’s board of health, sent out a news release on Monday warning residents to be mindful of protecting themselves from mosquitos, and confirming the two cases including one that was a fatality.

One of the confirmed cases was in Spanish Fort. The other is near the city in an unincorporated area of Baldwin County, McMillan said.

“It’s been a lot of reaction on social media, if you can imagine,” McMillan said. “There is concern.”

He said that public health officials are examining areas where there is standing water, including swimming pools.

“We are adjacent to a swamp, the Delta,” said McMillan. “There are a lot of different breeds of mosquitos. You worry about the places that hold water and the board of health is doing tests on reports of standing water.”

He added, “It’s an ongoing process. We are doing all we can do until we get determination of species.”

EEE is a virus, which is transmitted by mosquito bites. It is extremely rare. There was only one case in the U.S. last year, and only eight previous cases in Alabama since 2003. On average, nationwide, there are 11 cases of EEE each year.

It’s a dangerous and deadly virus. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about one of our every three people infected from EEE die from it.

Even for people who do recover from EEE, they can be left with long-term physical or mental impairments, which can range from brain dysfunction to severe intellectual impairment, personality disorders, seizures, paralysis and cranial nerve dysfunction, according to the CDC.

There is no specific treatment for EEE, and antibiotics are not effective against the virus.