A geo-coded inventory of anophelines in the Afrotropical Region

Understanding the distribution of anopheline vectors of malaria is Background an important prelude to the design of national malaria control and elimination programmes. A single, geo-coded continental inventory of anophelines using all available published and unpublished data has not been undertaken since the 1960s. : We have searched African, European and World Health Methods Organization archives to identify unpublished reports on anopheline surveys in 48 sub-Saharan Africa countries. This search was supplemented by identification of reports that formed part of post-graduate theses, conference abstracts, regional insecticide resistance databases and more traditional bibliographic searches of peer-reviewed literature. Finally, a check was made against two recent repositories of dominant malaria vector species locations ( 2,500). Each report was used to extract information on the survey dates, circa village locations (geo-coded to provide a longitude and latitude), sampling methods, species identification methods and all anopheline species found present during the survey. Survey records were collapsed to a single site over time. : The search strategy took years and resulted in 13,331 unique, Results geo-coded survey locations of anopheline vector occurrence between 1898 and 2016. A total of 12,204 (92%) sites reported the presence of 10 dominant vector species/sibling species; 4,473 (37%) of these sites were sampled since 2005. 4,442 (33%) sites reported at least one of 13 possible secondary vector species; 1,107 (25%) of these sites were sampled since 2005. Distributions of dominant and secondary vectors conform to previous descriptions of the ecological ranges of these vectors. : We have assembled the largest ever geo-coded database of Conclusion anophelines in Africa, representing a legacy dataset for future updating and identification of knowledge gaps at national levels. The geo-coded database is available on as a reference source for African national Harvard Dataverse malaria control programmes planning their future control and elimination strategies. 1 1 1 1 2,3