Abstract
Interest in larval source management (LSM) as an adjunct intervention to control and eliminate malaria transmission has recently increased mainly because long-lasting insecticidal nets (LLINs) and indoor residual spray (IRS) are ineffective against exophagic and exophilic mosquitoes. In Amazonian Peru, the identification of the most productive, positive water bodies would increase the impact of targeted mosquito control on aquatic life stages. The present study explores the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) for identifying Nyssorhynchus darlingi (formerly Anopheles darlingi) breeding sites with high-resolution imagery (~0.02m/pixel) and their multispectral profile in Amazonian Peru. Our results show that high-resolution multispectral imagery can discriminate a profile of water bodies where Ny. darlingi is most likely to breed (overall accuracy 86.73%- 96.98%) with a moderate differentiation of spectral bands. This work provides proof-of-concept of the use of high-resolution images to detect malaria vector breeding sites in Amazonian Peru and such innovative methodology could be crucial for LSM malaria integrated interventions.
Highlights
The most widespread strategies to combat malaria rely on the distribution of long-lasting insecticide-treated nets (LLINs) [1] and the application of indoor residual spray (IRS) [2] that target endophagic and endophilic mosquito vectors
larval source management (LSM) trials have been conducted in Africa in part because the habitats of African anophelines are well characterized; such trials have shown that larvicides can reduce malaria transmission from 70–90% [7]
Drone-based detection of malaria vector larval habitats community and survey is presented in S3 Fig for all water bodies inspected and for the 16 water bodies selected for multispectral mapping
Summary
The most widespread strategies to combat malaria rely on the distribution of long-lasting insecticide-treated nets (LLINs) [1] and the application of indoor residual spray (IRS) [2] that target endophagic and endophilic mosquito vectors. The decline in their efficiency is associated mainly with: a) insecticide contact avoidance by early-exiting behavior of mosquitoes feeding indoors [3]; b) increased outdoor feeding and transmission; c) zoophilic behavior; and d) insecticide resistance [4]. Potential breeding sites are periodically flooded, making field surveys difficult [16]; sometimes natural breeding sites are nearly impossible to detect visually by ground-truthing due to extensive, dense vegetation
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