Journal Article

Differing taxonomic responses of mosquito vectors to anthropogenic land-use change in Latin America and the Caribbean

Jones, Kate E., Fletcher, Isabel K., Gibb, Rory, Lowe, Rachel

2023

Overview

Anthropogenic land-use change, such as deforestation and urban development, can affect the emergence and re-emergence of mosquito-borne diseases, e.g., dengue and malaria, by creating more favourable vector habitats. There has been a limited assessment of how mosquito vectors respond to land-use changes, including differential species responses, and the dynamic nature of these responses. Improved understanding could help design effective disease control strategies. We compiled an extensive dataset of 10,244 Aedes and Anopheles mosquito abundance records across multiple land-use types at 632 sites in Latin America and the Caribbean. Using a Bayesian mixed effects modelling framework to account for between-study differences, we compared spatial differences in the abundance and species richness of mosquitoes across multiple land-use types, including agricultural and urban areas. Overall, we found that mosquito responses to anthropogenic land-use change were highly inconsistent, with pronounced responses observed at the genus- and species levels. There were strong declines in Aedes (-26%) and Anopheles (-35%) species richness in urban areas, however certain species such as Aedes aegypti , thrived in response to anthropogenic disturbance. When abundance records were coupled with remotely sensed forest loss data, we detected a strong positive response of dominant and secondary malaria vectors to recent deforestation. This highlights the importance of the temporal dynamics of land-use change in driving disease risk and the value of large synthetic datasets for understanding changing disease risk with environmental change.

• Publisher: Public Library of Science,Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subject: Abundance / Aedes / Aedes - physiology / Aedes albopictus / Analysis / Animals / Anopheles / Anopheles - physiology / Anthropogenic factors / Aquatic insects / Bayes Theorem / Bayesian analysis / Biology / Biology and Life Sciences / Caribbean Region / Datasets / Deforestation / Dengue fever / Disease control / Earth Sciences / Ecology and Environmental Sciences / Ecosystem disturbance / Emergence / Environmental changes / Habitats / Health risks / Human diseases / Identification and classification / Land use / Latin America / Malaria / Medicine and Health Sciences / Methods / Mosquito Vectors / Mosquitoes / Multiple land use / Phenetics / Population decline / Probability theory / Records / Remote sensing / Social Sciences / Spatial variations / Species richness / Synthetic data / Tropical diseases / Urban agriculture / Urban areas / Urban development / Urbanization / Vector-borne diseases / Vectors