article · Journal of Medical Entomology
Malaria remains a major public health challenge in sub-Saharan Africa, where primary control tools such as indoor residual spraying and insecticide-treated bed nets focus on indoor-feeding mosquitoes. However, outdoor-biting vectors may bypass these interventions. Genetic and behavioural analysis of Anopheles coustani specimens trapped outdoors in high-transmission areas of northern Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo reveals significant transmission potential. Analysis using mitochondrial and ribosomal DNA markers confirmed fifty Anopheles coustani sensu stricto specimens, which split into two distinct phylogenetic groups. Both groups exhibit human-feeding tendencies, outdoor biting habits, and regular contact with the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum. Because these mosquitoes feed outdoors and target humans, they represent potential alternative malaria vectors capable of avoiding conventional indoor control strategies across transmission foci in southern and central Africa.
Standard malaria control programmes rely heavily on indoor nets and sprays, leaving outdoor transmission unaddressed. Demonstrating that Anopheles coustani actively feeds on humans outdoors and carries malaria parasites shows that alternative mosquito species could sustain transmission. Understanding the genetic diversity and feeding behaviours of such vectors helps public health programmes adapt control strategies to target outdoor-biting mosquito populations more effectively.
The findings represent early-stage research that could inform the development of novel outdoor vector control products and surveillance tools. Public health agencies, vector control programmes, and developers of outdoor mosquito interventions, such as spatial repellents or outdoor bait traps, could use these insights to target neglected vector species. Commercialisation or operational deployment of specific tools remains distant, as the immediate utility is in diagnostic surveillance and guiding intervention strategies.
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Despite ongoing malaria control efforts implemented throughout sub-Saharan Africa, malaria remains an enormous public health concern. Current interventions such as indoor residual spraying with insecticides and use of insecticide-treated bed nets are aimed at targeting the key malaria vectors that are primarily endophagic and endophilic. Anopheles coustani s.l., an understudied vector of malaria, is a species previously thought to exhibit mostly zoophilic behavior. Like many of these understudied species, An. coustani has greater anthropophilic tendencies than previously appreciated, is often both endophagic and exophagic, and carries Plasmodium falciparum sporozoites. The aim of this study was to explore genetic variation of An. coustani mosquitoes and the potential of this species to contribute to malaria parasite transmission in high transmission settings in Zambia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Morphologically identified An. coustani specimens that were trapped outdoors in these study sites were analyzed by PCR and sequencing for species identification and bloodmeal sources, and malaria parasite infection was determined by ELISA and qPCR. Fifty An. coustani s.s. specimens were confirmed by analysis of mitochondrial DNA cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (COI) and ribosomal internal transcribed spacer region 2 (ITS2). Maximum likelihood phylogenetic analysis of COI and ITS2 sequences revealed two distinct phylogenetic groups within this relatively small regional collection. Our findings indicate that both An. coustani groups have anthropophilic and exophagic habits and come into frequent contact with P. falciparum, suggesting that this potential alternative malaria vector might elude current vector control measures in northern Zambia and southern DRC.
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DOI: 10.1093/jme/tjaa132
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