TY - JOUR
T1 - Human biting mosquitoes and implications for West Nile virus transmission
AU - Uelmen, Johnny A.
AU - Lamcyzk, Bennett
AU - Irwin, Patrick
AU - Bartlett, Dan
AU - Stone, Chris
AU - Mackay, Andrew
AU - Arsenault-Benoit, Arielle
AU - Ryan, Sadie J.
AU - Mutebi, John Paul
AU - Hamer, Gabriel L.
AU - Fritz, Megan
AU - Smith, Rebecca L.
N1 - Funding Information:
This publication was supported by Cooperative Agreement #U01 CK000505, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and partially supported by Cooperative Agreement #U01 CK000505, funded by the National Science Foundation grants EF-0429124 and EF-0840403. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention or the Department of Health and Human Services.
Funding Information:
We thank the Macon Mosquito Abatement, especially Jason Probus and Sam Force, for supplying historical records to digitize for this study. We would also like to thank Serena Schatz and Alvin Hernandez Reyes for their assistance with field work and data collection. The findings and conclusions in this manuscript are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or the Department of Health and Human Services.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022, The Author(s).
PY - 2023/12
Y1 - 2023/12
N2 - Background: West Nile virus (WNV), primarily vectored by mosquitoes of the genus Culex, is the most important mosquito-borne pathogen in North America, having infected thousands of humans and countless wildlife since its arrival in the USA in 1999. In locations with dedicated mosquito control programs, surveillance methods often rely on frequent testing of mosquitoes collected in a network of gravid traps (GTs) and CO2-baited light traps (LTs). Traps specifically targeting oviposition-seeking (e.g. GTs) and host-seeking (e.g. LTs) mosquitoes are vulnerable to trap bias, and captured specimens are often damaged, making morphological identification difficult. Methods: This study leverages an alternative mosquito collection method, the human landing catch (HLC), as a means to compare sampling of potential WNV vectors to traditional trapping methods. Human collectors exposed one limb for 15 min at crepuscular periods (5:00–8:30 am and 6:00–9:30 pm daily, the time when Culex species are most actively host-seeking) at each of 55 study sites in suburban Chicago, Illinois, for two summers (2018 and 2019). Results: A total of 223 human-seeking mosquitoes were caught by HLC, of which 46 (20.6%) were mosquitoes of genus Culex. Of these 46 collected Culex specimens, 34 (73.9%) were Cx. salinarius, a potential WNV vector species not thought to be highly abundant in upper Midwest USA. Per trapping effort, GTs and LTs collected > 7.5-fold the number of individual Culex specimens than HLC efforts. Conclusions: The less commonly used HLC method provides important insight into the complement of human-biting mosquitoes in a region with consistent WNV epidemics. This study underscores the value of the HLC collection method as a complementary tool for surveillance to aid in WNV vector species characterization. However, given the added risk to the collector, novel mitigation methods or alternative approaches must be explored to incorporate HLC collections safely and strategically into control programs. Graphical Abstract: [Figure not available: see fulltext.].
AB - Background: West Nile virus (WNV), primarily vectored by mosquitoes of the genus Culex, is the most important mosquito-borne pathogen in North America, having infected thousands of humans and countless wildlife since its arrival in the USA in 1999. In locations with dedicated mosquito control programs, surveillance methods often rely on frequent testing of mosquitoes collected in a network of gravid traps (GTs) and CO2-baited light traps (LTs). Traps specifically targeting oviposition-seeking (e.g. GTs) and host-seeking (e.g. LTs) mosquitoes are vulnerable to trap bias, and captured specimens are often damaged, making morphological identification difficult. Methods: This study leverages an alternative mosquito collection method, the human landing catch (HLC), as a means to compare sampling of potential WNV vectors to traditional trapping methods. Human collectors exposed one limb for 15 min at crepuscular periods (5:00–8:30 am and 6:00–9:30 pm daily, the time when Culex species are most actively host-seeking) at each of 55 study sites in suburban Chicago, Illinois, for two summers (2018 and 2019). Results: A total of 223 human-seeking mosquitoes were caught by HLC, of which 46 (20.6%) were mosquitoes of genus Culex. Of these 46 collected Culex specimens, 34 (73.9%) were Cx. salinarius, a potential WNV vector species not thought to be highly abundant in upper Midwest USA. Per trapping effort, GTs and LTs collected > 7.5-fold the number of individual Culex specimens than HLC efforts. Conclusions: The less commonly used HLC method provides important insight into the complement of human-biting mosquitoes in a region with consistent WNV epidemics. This study underscores the value of the HLC collection method as a complementary tool for surveillance to aid in WNV vector species characterization. However, given the added risk to the collector, novel mitigation methods or alternative approaches must be explored to incorporate HLC collections safely and strategically into control programs. Graphical Abstract: [Figure not available: see fulltext.].
KW - Culex salinarius
KW - Human landing catch
KW - Spillover
KW - Vector-borne disease
KW - West Nile virus
KW - Zoonosis
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U2 - 10.1186/s13071-022-05603-1
DO - 10.1186/s13071-022-05603-1
M3 - Article
C2 - 36593496
AN - SCOPUS:85145376078
SN - 1756-3305
VL - 16
JO - Parasites and Vectors
JF - Parasites and Vectors
IS - 1
M1 - 2
ER -