Public Acceptance of and Willingness to Pay for Mosquito Control, Texas, USA.

Mosquito control is essential to reduce vectorborne disease risk. We surveyed residents in Harris, Tarrant, and Hidalgo Counties, Texas, USA, to estimate willingness-to-pay for mosquito control and acceptance of control methods. Results show an unmet demand for expanded mosquito control that could be funded through local taxes or fees.

Distribution of Culex coronator in Texas.

The distribution of Culex coronator Dyar and Knab by county in Texas was updated by combining data from peer-reviewed literature, military and government reports, and university and private collections, and by collecting specimens from counties where data had not been reported. With 254 counties in Texas, the initial collection effort was focused on counties east of US Highway 277, which runs from Val Verde County on the US and Mexico border to Wichita County on the Texas and Oklahoma border. The study resulted in 127 counties with Cx. coronator presence data. The remaining 127 counties need to be surveyed for this species.

A Model of Culex quinquefasciatus Abundance Constructed Using Routine Surveillance and Treatment Data in Tarrant County, Texas.

Mosquito surveillance and pesticide treatment data can be combined in statistical models to provide insight into drivers of mosquito population dynamics. In cooperation with the county-based public health authority, multiple municipalities in Tarrant County, Texas, supplied surveillance and pesticide treatment data available from the 2014 mosquito season for analysis. With these data, general linear mixed modeling was used to model population dynamics of Culex quinquefasciatus, the primary vector for West Nile virus. Temporally lagged pesticide treatment information, weather data, and habitat variables were used as predictors of log + 1 transformed mosquito count data, and Akaike information criteria corrected for small sample sizes (AICc)-based model selection and multimodel averaging was used to produce a final model of mosquito abundance. The model revealed that mosquito counts were driven mainly by seasonally fluctuating temperature, precipitation, human population density, and treatment. In particular, interactions between temperature and treatment, and precipitation and human population density significantly contributed to the interpretation of the effects of the nonweather variables.

Predictive Modeling for West Nile Virus and Mosquito Surveillance in Lubbock, Texas.

West Nile virus (WNV) was first detected in North America during 1999, and has since spread throughout the contiguous USA. West Nile virus causes West Nile fever and the more severe West Nile neuroinvasive disease. As part of a WNV vector surveillance program, we collected mosquitoes in Lubbock, Texas, using CO2-baited encephalitic vector survey (EVS) traps. During 219 wk from 2009 through 2017, EVS traps were operated for 1,748 trap nights, resulting in more than 101,000 mosquitoes captured. Weekly, selected female mosquito specimens were pooled by species and trap site, and screened for WNV using reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction assay. Mosquitoes positive for WNV were detected during 16.9% (37/219) of the weeks. Using this information, we constructed a statistical model to predict the probability of detecting an infection within a mosquito pool as a factor of weather variables. The final model indicated that detection of WNV in mosquitoes was negatively associated with the week of year squared and average wind from 3 wk prior to sampling, and was positively associated with week of year, average visibility, average humidity from 2 wk prior to sampling, and average dew point from 4 wk prior to sampling. The model developed in this study may aid public health and vector control programs in swift and effective decision making relative to city-wide mosquito control efforts by predicting when the chances of mosquitoes having WNV are at their greatest.