5 Massachusetts Towns Urged To Curtail Activities For EEE

The Massachusetts Department of Health is urging five communities to curtail evening outdoor activities after the death of a Norfolk County woman from mosquito-borne Eastern equine encephalitis.

The health department said Wednesday it is raising its risk designation to "high'' for Hanover, Hanson, Rockland, Weymouth and Whitman. Officials announced Tuesday that a woman in her 80s had recently died of EEE and was the first human case of the virus in Massachusetts this year.

Officials didn't identify the woman, but family members have told local news outlets she lived in Weymouth. Earlier this month, Belchertown in western Massachusetts was deemed at ``critical'' risk after EEE was found in two horses, and nearby Amherst was rated ``high'' risk.

There were seven EEE cases in Massachusetts last year, and at least two deaths.