Latin American Symposium
Latin American Symposium
In 2019, over 3 million dengue cases were reported in Latin America, including 27,500 in El Salvador. The municipalities of Santa Ana, Chalchuapa, and San Sebastian Salitrillo experienced the highest dengue burden from 2015-2019. A collaborative project between Puerto Rico Vector Control Unit (PRVCU), El Salvador’s Ministry of Health, World Mosquito Program (WMP), and CDC Dengue Branch has been implemented to determine the successful establishment of Wolbachia replacement in three areas. The PRVCU and CDC are implementing a parallel surveillance to evaluate diverse factors to monitor the populations of Aedes aegypti, the presence of arbovirus in adult mosquitoes, and the replacement of the native Ae. aegypti population with Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes that would block dengue virus transmission in western El Salvador. WMP will conduct a control and monitoring program to evaluate the rate of mosquito population replacement using household aspirations during short periods of time during implementation and sporadically afterwards, within the five-year observational period of the project. This parallel surveillance intends to complement WMP’s surveillance system and extend surveillance for the project lifetime. The project will be developed in three stages: (1) evaluation of the efficacy in capturing Ae. albopictus and Ae. aegypti between Autocidal Gravid Ovitrap (AGO) traps and Bioagent Sentinel 2 (BG) traps to determine which trap is more efficient; (2) depending on the results of the first stage, either AGO or BG traps will be deployed and surveillance of adult mosquitoes in residential areas will begin; and (3) long-term monitoring after the establishment of Wolbachia in the release area. This longitudinal measurement will allow us to understand the factors that determine the longevity and sustainability of Wolbachia in an area. The proposed presentation will show this methodology in detail and the preliminary results.