Mitigating dengue transmission in Africa: the need for Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes’ rollout
Mitigating dengue transmission in Africa: the need for Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes’ rollout
Tags: Africa, Dengue, Vector control, WolbachiaSamson Ogunlade, Adeshina Adekunle, Emma McBryde, Frontiers, 12. 2025.
Dengue fever is a mosquito-borne viral disease that poses a significant public health concern globally. The disease is primarily transmitted by Aedes aegypti mosquitoes and the range of clinical manifestations vary from flu-like symptoms to more serious conditions such as dengue haemorrhagic fever and dengue shock syndrome. The dengue virus (DENV) infects about 400 million people yearly, of which 50–100 million of those become symptomatic, with over 20,000 deaths. Dengue notifications are increasing in Africa. The continent’s tropical and subtropical climatic conditions create a conducive breeding environment for mosquitoes and hence, contribute to the spread of the virus. While recent statistics show that there were 15.7 million reported dengue infections in 2010, recent studies show that dengue cases are on the rise in Africa. This situation presents an increasing threat to public health systems already under pressure from other infectious illnesses.
Traditionally established vector control methods such as the use of insecticide, emptying or covering water-filled containers and eliminating mosquito breeding sites have had limited success in curbing the spread of dengue. This calls for experimental and innovative strategies to combat the disease effectively. One promising approach—the Wolbachia-based approach, involves the deployment of Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes into the wild mosquito population. This technique has shown great potential in reducing dengue transmission. While the Wolbachia-based technique has demonstrated highly positive results in mitigating DENV, it is not always successful—Wolbachia strategies may struggle in high temperature settings, because some mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia (such as wMel strain) are unable to transmit Wolbachia maternally to their offspring and establish themselves under high temperatures. Therefore, using thermally tolerant strains may be beneficial in establishing Wolbachia infections in mosquitoes especially in regions with high heat conditions. Although Wolbachia-infected mosquitoes have been rolled out in different countries such as Brazil, Colombia in South America; Indonesia, Taiwan, Viet Nam, Thailand, Malaysia, India in South Asia; Northern Queensland in Australia; and the United States of America, there is arguably no deployment yet made in Africa. In this opinion piece, we discuss the urgent need to begin the implementation the Wolbachia-based strategy in Africa as a complimentary control strategy to other existing control methods on the continent. This may be useful in contributing to the mitigation or eradication of DENV especially in high endemic settings.
