MOSQUITOES AND THE ENVIRONMENT: SOME ECONOMIC COSTS OF MALARIA IN NIGERIA

Abstract

The abundance of anopheline mosquitoes was investigated in various aquatic environments in the month of October 2003 in Benin-City using dippers. Four main types of environment: clean pools of water without algae; clean clear pools with algae; clean/semi polluted pools with slight laterite colour and algae; and polluted pools with refuse and algae were studied. Only pools with algae harboured anopheline larvae, those that were clean/semi-polluted with slight laterite colour and al.gae having the bulk (68.7%); followed by the clean dear pools with algae (22.5%); the least abundance occurred in polluted pools with refuse and algae (8.8%). The worry here is that there are too many cities in Nigeria with the same or even worse features as that of Benin; and there are too many cities that have pools with algae. This study is set out to find out, among other things whether the environmental management practices in Nigeria have targeted mosquitoes the vector of malaria effectively. The results indicate that there is need to strengthen environmental management in the current malaria control programme. It is therefore recommended that the regular inspection of the state of sanitation of the environments in and around cities (like in the colonial era) should be reintroduced among other strategies.