Mosquito-borne disease surveillance by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control

Abstract

For a few years, a series of traditionally tropical mosquito-borne diseases, such as chikungunya fever and dengue, have posed challenges to national public health authorities in the European region. Other diseases have re-emerged, e.g. malaria in Greece, or spread to other countries, e.g. West Nile fever. These diseases are reportable within the European Union (EU), and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control collects information in various ways to provide EU member states with topical assessments of disease threats, risks and trends for prompt and appropriate public health action. Using disease-specific expert networks, the European Surveillance System (TESSy) collects standardized comparable information on all statutory communicable diseases in a database. In addition, the event-based surveillance aims to detect potential public health threats early, and to allow timely response and support to blood deferral decisions for pathogens that can be transmitted through blood donation. Laboratory capacity for early detection is implemented through external quality assessments. Other activities include the development of guidelines for the surveillance of mosquito vectors, and the production of regularly updated maps on the currently known occurrence of mosquito vector species.

Lack of usutu virus RNA in cerebrospinal fluid of patients with encephalitis of unknown etiology, Tuscany, Italy

“…Recently, an increasing number of mosquito‐borne diseases have been reported in several European countries, involving different types of pathogens like Dengue virus (DENV), Chikungunya virus, JEV, and Yellow fever virus (YFV) and, considered typically infecting tropical areas [Zeller et al, ]. More interestingly, a clear evidence exists about co‐circulation of WNV and USUV in mosquitoes and birds in the same geographic area.…”

Fighting the Bite during Pandemics: Florida Mosquito Control District Capabilities during the COVID-19 crisis

“…There is no questions that mosquito-borne diseases pose a special challenge to public health practitioners and mosquito control districts [1][2][3], owing to their complex nature (biological transmission complexity) [4], and potential to transmit infectious agents that can lead to mosquito-borne diseases, such as malaria, dengue fever, chikungunya, Zika fever, and West Nile fever [5]. In Florida, Aedes and Culex continue to be major vector genera [6][7][8], with the State of Florida having been ground-zero for local transmission of Zika and Dengue viruses [9], and is in close proximity to Latin American where viruses such as Zika and dengue viruses are endemic [2,10].…”

Integrated surveillance for prevention and control of emerging vector-borne diseases in Europe

“…Astute surveillance activities were able to detect the autochthonous transmission of Chikungunya and dengue viruses by Ae. albopictus in Europe triggered by infected travellers returning from endemic areas [13,14]. Through vector surveillance, Ae.…”