Urban environmental clustering to assess the spatial dynamics of Aedes aegypti breeding sites

ALBRIEU-LLINÁS, GUILLERMO; ESPINOSA, MANUEL O; QUAGLIA, AGUSTÍN; ABRIL, MARCELO; SCAVUZZO, CARLOS MARCELO

GEOSPATIAL HEALTH

UNIV NAPLES FEDERICO II

Año: 2018 vol. 13 p. 135 - 142

1827-1987

The identification of Aedes aegypti breeding hotspots in urbanareas is crucial for the rational design of control strategies againstthis disease vector. Remote sensing and geographic informationsystems offer valuable tools for mapping habitat suitability of agiven area. However, predicting species occurrences by means ofprobability distribution maps based on transversal entomologicalsurveys has limited utility for local authorities. The aim of the presentstudy was to carefully examine the temporal evolution of thenumber of houses infested with immature stages of Ae. aegypti ineach individual neighbourhood and to explore the value of producingenvironmental clusters generated with information providedby remotely sensed variables to explain the observed differentialtemporal behaviour. Entomological surveys were conductedbetween 2011 and 2013 throughout a small town in Argentina registeringthe number of houses with containers harbouring immaturestages of Ae. aegypti. A SPOT 5 satellite image was used toobtain land cover variables, which were subsequently submitted tok-means partitioning for grouping neighbourhoods into four environmentalclusters. Finally, a generalized linear model was fittedshowing that the number of houses found to be positive for Ae.aegypti was jointly affected by the interaction between environmentalclusters and the year of sampling. Moreover, the number ofpositive houses in one of the clusters was 9.5 times higher(P