Abstract
BackgroundWest Nile virus (WNV) is currently the most important mosquito-borne pathogen spreading in Europe. Data on overwintering of WNV in mosquitoes are crucial for understanding WNV circulation in Europe; nonetheless, such data were not available so far.ResultsA total of 28,287 hibernating mosquitoes [27,872 Culex pipiens, 73 Anopheles maculipennis (sensulato), and 342 Culiseta annulata], caught in February or March between 2011 and 2017 in a WNV-endemic region of South Moravia, Czech Republic, were screened for the presence of WNV RNA. No WNV positive pools were found from 2011 to 2016, while lineage 2 WNV RNA was detected in three pools of Culex pipens mosquitoes collected in 2017 at two study sites.ConclusionsTo the best of our knowledge, this is the first record of WNV RNA in overwintering mosquitoes in Europe. The data support the hypothesis of WNV persistence in mosquitoes throughout the winter season in Europe.
Highlights
West Nile virus (WNV) is currently the most important mosquito-borne pathogen spreading in Europe
The mosquito homogenates were tested by conventional reverse transcriptionpolymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) for flaviviral RNA by using the protocol published by Scaramozzino et al [17], and the Qiagen OneStep RT-PCR Kit (Qiagen) [18, 19]
All mosquito pools from 2011 to 2016 were negative, while in three Cx. pipiens pools from 2017 WNV nucleic acid was demonstrated: in specimen 17-06 from Hlohovec collected on 27th February and in two samples from Lednice collected on 21st February
Summary
West Nile virus (WNV) is currently the most important mosquito-borne pathogen spreading in Europe. West Nile virus (WNV) is a mosquito-borne virus (genus Flavivirus; family Flaviviridae) with nearly cosmopolitan distribution [1]. In nature, it circulates between birds (as amplifying hosts) and bird-feeding mosquitoes, in Europe predominantly Culex pipiens [2, 3]. Since 2008, an unexpected explosive spread of this WNV-2 resulted in several hundreds of human and animal neuroinvasive cases in Hungary [5], Austria [5, 6], Greece [7, 8], Serbia [9], and Italy [10]. In the Czech Republic, four identical strains of WNV-2 were isolated from Cx. modestus mosquitoes collected in reed beds at South-Moravian fishponds in 2013 [11]
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