Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus

The primary mosquito species associated with underground stormwater systems in the United States are the Culex pipiens complex species. This group represents important vectors of West Nile virus (WNV) throughout regions of the continental U.S. In this study, we designed a mathematical model and comp...

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Main Authors:	Pawelek, Kasia A., Niehaus, Patrick, Salmeron, Cristian, Hager, Elizabeth J., Hunt, Gregg J.
Format:	Online
Language:	English
Published:	Public Library of Science 2014
Online Access:	https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4182476/

id	pubmed-4182476
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	pubmed-41824762014-10-07 Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus Pawelek, Kasia A. Niehaus, Patrick Salmeron, Cristian Hager, Elizabeth J. Hunt, Gregg J. Research Article The primary mosquito species associated with underground stormwater systems in the United States are the Culex pipiens complex species. This group represents important vectors of West Nile virus (WNV) throughout regions of the continental U.S. In this study, we designed a mathematical model and compared it with surveillance data for the Cx. pipiens complex collected in Beaufort County, South Carolina. Based on the best fit of the model to the data, we estimated parameters associated with the effectiveness of public health insecticide (adulticide) treatments (primarily pyrethrin products) as well as the birth, maturation, and death rates of immature and adult Cx. pipiens complex mosquitoes. We used these estimates for modeling the spread of WNV to obtain more reliable disease outbreak predictions and performed numerical simulations to test various mosquito abatement strategies. We demonstrated that insecticide treatments produced significant reductions in the Cx. pipiens complex populations. However, abatement efforts were effective for approximately one day and the vector mosquitoes rebounded until the next treatment. These results suggest that frequent insecticide applications are necessary to control these mosquitoes. We derived the basic reproductive number (ℜ0) to predict the conditions under which disease outbreaks are likely to occur and to evaluate mosquito abatement strategies. We concluded that enhancing the mosquito death rate results in lower values of ℜ0, and if ℜ0<1, then an epidemic will not occur. Our modeling results provide insights about control strategies of the vector populations and, consequently, a potential decrease in the risk of a WNV outbreak. Public Library of Science 2014-09-30 /pmc/articles/PMC4182476/ /pubmed/25268229 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0108452 Text en https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Public Domain declaration, which stipulates that, once placed in the public domain, this work may be freely reproduced, distributed, transmitted, modified, built upon, or otherwise used by anyone for any lawful purpose.
repository_type	Open Access Journal
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	US National Center for Biotechnology Information
building	NCBI PubMed
collection	Online Access
language	English
format	Online
author	Pawelek, Kasia A. Niehaus, Patrick Salmeron, Cristian Hager, Elizabeth J. Hunt, Gregg J.
spellingShingle	Pawelek, Kasia A. Niehaus, Patrick Salmeron, Cristian Hager, Elizabeth J. Hunt, Gregg J. Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus
author_facet	Pawelek, Kasia A. Niehaus, Patrick Salmeron, Cristian Hager, Elizabeth J. Hunt, Gregg J.
author_sort	Pawelek, Kasia A.
title	Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus
title_short	Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus
title_full	Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus
title_fullStr	Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus
title_full_unstemmed	Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus
title_sort	modeling dynamics of culex pipiens complex populations and assessing abatement strategies for west nile virus
description	The primary mosquito species associated with underground stormwater systems in the United States are the Culex pipiens complex species. This group represents important vectors of West Nile virus (WNV) throughout regions of the continental U.S. In this study, we designed a mathematical model and compared it with surveillance data for the Cx. pipiens complex collected in Beaufort County, South Carolina. Based on the best fit of the model to the data, we estimated parameters associated with the effectiveness of public health insecticide (adulticide) treatments (primarily pyrethrin products) as well as the birth, maturation, and death rates of immature and adult Cx. pipiens complex mosquitoes. We used these estimates for modeling the spread of WNV to obtain more reliable disease outbreak predictions and performed numerical simulations to test various mosquito abatement strategies. We demonstrated that insecticide treatments produced significant reductions in the Cx. pipiens complex populations. However, abatement efforts were effective for approximately one day and the vector mosquitoes rebounded until the next treatment. These results suggest that frequent insecticide applications are necessary to control these mosquitoes. We derived the basic reproductive number (ℜ0) to predict the conditions under which disease outbreaks are likely to occur and to evaluate mosquito abatement strategies. We concluded that enhancing the mosquito death rate results in lower values of ℜ0, and if ℜ0<1, then an epidemic will not occur. Our modeling results provide insights about control strategies of the vector populations and, consequently, a potential decrease in the risk of a WNV outbreak.
publisher	Public Library of Science
publishDate	2014
url	https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4182476/
_version_	1613139914022453248

Modeling Dynamics of Culex pipiens Complex Populations and Assessing Abatement Strategies for West Nile Virus

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