Adjunct Senior Arbovirologist Anastasia Mosquito Control District, Maryland, United States
Abstract: Mosquitoes and other arthropods can transmit pathogens that currently cause millions of cases of illness and over 700,000 deaths annually. For most of these, the most efficient prevention is mosquito control. However, only a small number of mosquito species are responsible for pathogen transmission, and different species are important for different pathogens. Because mosquito control tends to be focused on specific species, it is critical to ensure that the control efforts are directed at the species that are actually involved in pathogen transmission in the real world. Control directed at the most annoying mosquitoes may actually increase the amount of disease that occurs during an outbreak. Therefore, it is important to understand what makes a particular species of mosquito a vector and the various factors that affect the ability of a potential “vector” to actually transmit a pathogen so that control can be directed at the appropriate species at the appropriate time.
