The Ontario government took a swat at the West Nile virus on Saturday, unveiling an action plan for the 2003 mosquito season that will see it nearly double funding for the program.

Ontario Health Minister Tony Clement revealed the seven-point plan on Saturday just weeks before the West Nile Virus will be on the move, once again, in Canada.

"People in Ontario will now be equipped with the knowledge...to be the best protected in the country," Clement said.

The action plan will see the government spend roughly double what it spent last year. The exact amount will be outlined in Thursday's budget. "This provincial funding can and will be raised if the need is found to exist," Clement said.

As part of the plan, the government plans to hire more staff and add more equipment to ensure a faster turn-around for test results. Doctors will now get a diagnosis within two days, rather than the weeks -- or months -- it took last summer.

Human surveillance of the virus will also be increased. As of May 1, West Nile will be designated both a reportable and communicable disease. That means physicians will be required to report every West Nile diagnosis to the local medical health officer, who will turn it over to the province.

Perhaps the most controversial aspect of the plan is how mosquitoes -- blamed for spreading the disease -- will be brought under control. Ontario plans to establish guidelines on the use of larvicides or chemical sprays.

Environmentalists are staunchly against spraying pesticides to control the mosquito population, and on Saturday, Clement said such a measure would only be taken as a "last resort."

The plan also sets out to:

• Expand a public-education campaign, focusing on personal protection and safeguarding areas around the home;
• Establish a new early warning system to better track the outbreak. Information collected on West Nile virus will be tracked through a central database;
• Conduct pilot study to determine how many people have been exposed to the virus; and
• Fund research aimed at finding better ways to battle West Nile.

"Our strategy will attack this disease on a number of fronts and build on the experience and research we have conducted over the last three years," said Dr. Colin D'Cunha, Ontario's Commissioner of Public Health.

"Prevention of West Nile virus is a matter of public education first and foremost, and we will show how the disease is spread and what people can do to protect themselves and their families."

The plan has its critics. Alan Elgar, a counsellor in Oakville, says it lacks details and still requires regions to pay for half the cost of mosquito control -- costs that could run into the millions of dollars in some areas.

"It looks good from afar, but it's far from good when you get into details, and we don't have details," Elgar told CTV News.

Some West Nile survivors say the action plan comes a year too late for those who died or were left ill. Huguette Thompson, the wife of a West Nile survivor, is among a group planning to launch their own awareness program.

"Our goal is to educate the public about what West Nile virus is and to lobby the government to take appropriate action," Thompson told CTV.

The infection rate in Canada has grown steadily since the virus was first detected in Ontario in 2001, two years after it appeared on the North American continent in New York City.

Only one person has died directly from the disease. That death was in Ontario last summer. Seventeen others across the province who have tested positive for West Nile have died and 387 others across Canada have become ill since last year.

Symptoms include a high fever, confusion, muscle weakness and severe headaches. Most people infected by the virus won't get sick but in a very few cases the illness is fatal.

With a report from The Canadian Press