Abstract

  Mosquitoes are well-known vectors of some medically important diseases worldwide. Vector-borne diseases (VBD) account for 17% of all infectious diseases and more than 90% of the world's population is at risk of vector-borne diseases. Monitoring of mosquito populations is essential prior to the implementation of any population management strategies. According to the recommendations of international health authorities, such as the World Health Organization, the standard design for collection of adult mosquitoes is a key operation to address the issue of VBD. In view of the incidence of Zika, Chikungunya and Dengue Fever epidemics in countries neighboring Iran and tackle the occurrence threat of VBD, a surveillance action was implemented in the Province of Qom, Iran, in line with the actions of local law enforcement authorities; the city of Qom is, the holy city of the Shiite religion and is rich in sacred places, such as the sanctuary of Bibi Fatima Masoumeh and the Holy Mosque of Jamkaran. It is characterized by the presence of pilgrims of different ethnic backgrounds from Iran as well as from over 100 countries world-wide. The city of Qom (Figure 1) acts as crossroads for the country, and can be at risk of transmission of mosquito-vectored diseases. Considering the risk of transmission of the above-mentioned diseases, in addition to West Nile Virus, not transmitted by Aedes mosquitoes, a qualitative entomological investigation of all mosquito species, including the invasive species, Aedes albopictus and Aedes aegypti, was conducted.

  One of the outcomes of this study was cooperation and scientific contribution of the two countries, Iran and Italy, on the population management strategies of Aedes albopictus. Rather extensive Italian experience was carefully utilized in designing the current scientific work concluding in publication of a manual in Farsi as well as in Italian languages entitled, “Lessons Learned from Rome to Qom in the Study of Aedes". Until now Iran has not been seriously considered at the risk of invasive mosquito species and the present study will be of help in the population management in the event of eventual establishment of invasive mosquito vector species. This contribution provides information concerning early and rather broad entomological surveillance conducted on mosquito populations in central Iran and on the risk of related VBD. During the 28 weeks of a field collecting campaign, a total of 83,414 adult mosquitoes were collected. During the investigation, no invasive mosquito species were recorded. There was a total of 15 mosquito species belonging to 5 genera in the collections. In addition to mosquitoes, 933 specimens of sandflies were also collected which were initially not the objective of the study. The field-collected mosquito data were analyzed using GIS and SPSS.

Keywords: Mosquitoes; Trapping; Iran; Qom; VBD; Aedes albopictus; Aedes aegypti; Arboviruses; Entomological Surveillance

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Citation

Citation: Asghar Talbalaghi., et al. “First Comprehensive Entomological Surveillance of Mosquitoes in Central Iran with Focus on Invasive Species". Acta Scientific Medical Sciences 4.10 (2020): 147-157.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2020 Asghar Talbalaghi., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.