VECTOR CONTROL IN INTERNATIONAL HEALTH WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION GENEVA 1972 © World Health Organization 1972 Publications of the World Health Organization enjoy copyright protection in accordance with the pro­ visions of Protocol 2 of the Universal Copyright Convention. Nevertheless governmental agencies or learned and professional societies may reproduce data or excerpts or illustrations from them without requesting an authorization from the World Health Organization. For rights of reproduction or translation of WHO publications in toto, application should be made to the Office of Publications and Translation, World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland. The World Health Organization welcomes such applications. The designations employed and the presentation of the material in this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Director-General of the World Health Organization concerning the legal status of any country or territory or of its authorities, or concerning the delimination of its frontiers. The mention of specific companies or of certain manufacturers' products does not imply that they are endorsed or recommended by the World Health Organization in preference to others of a similar nature which are not mentioned. Errors and omissions excepted, the names of proprietary products are distinguished by initial capital letters. PRINTED IN SWITZERLAND CONTENTS Page List of contributors on specialized topics 0 VI Preface CHAPTER 1. VECTOR CONTROL IN PORTS AND AIRPORTS o 3 General 0 0 3 Organization 3 Surveys 4 Maps 0 0 0 4 Climatological data 6 Environmental improvement 6 Chemical control 7 Biological control 0 0 0 0 0 11 Public relations 0 0 0 0 0 0 11 Surveillance and evaluation 0 11 CHAPTER 2o BIOLOGY AND CONTROL OF IMPORTANT INSECT VECTORS OF DISEASE o 14 General 0 14 Mosquitos 14 Fleas 34 Sucking lice 38 Other insects 41 CHAPTER 3o BIOLOGY AND CONTROL OF DOMESTIC RODENTS 46 General 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 46 Biology of domestic rats and mice 0 0 0 46 Control of domestic rodent populations 55 CHAPTER 4o VECTOR CONTROL IN SHIPS 70 General 0 0 0 0 70 Surveys 70 Control activities 70 CHAPTER 5o VECTOR CONTROL IN AIRCRAFT 73 General 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 73 Special considerations 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 73 Acceptable methods of insect control 74 Rodent control 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 75 Annex I. Identification of vectors 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 79 Annex 20 Tables of data for insect and rodent control 125 Annex 3o The safe use of pesticides o 0 o o 0 0 0 130 Annex 40 Extracts from the International Health Regulations relating to vector and rodent control 135 -V- LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS ON SPECIALIZED TOPICS MR G. C. COLLETT and MR J. E. GRAHAM Salt Lake City Mosquito Abatement District, Midvale, Utah, USA--organization and survey maps (Chapter 1) DR H. F. SCHOOF Center for Disease Control, US Public Health Service, Atlanta, Ga., USA-chemical control of insects (Chapter 2) DR K. D. QUARTERMAN and MR D. R. JoHNSON Center for Disease Control, US Public Health Service, Atlanta, Ga., USA-Anopheles and malaria transmission (Chapter 2) DR A. M. BARNES and DR B. W. HUDSON Center for Disease Control, US Jublic Health Service, Atlanta, Ga., USA-fleas (Chapter 2) DR H. B. MORLAN Center for Disease Control, US Public Health Service, Atlanta, Ga., USA-Aedes aegypti (Chapter 2) MR D. DRUMMOND Pest Infestation Laboratory, Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries and Food, United Kingdom-the biology and control of domestic rodents (Chapter 3) DR J. LEMBREZ Former Director of Sanitary Control at Sea and Air Frontiers, Marseille, France­ vector control in ships (Chapter 4) DR J. E. PORTER US Quarantine Station, Miami International Airport, Miami, Fla., USA-vector control in aircraft (Chapter 5) DR H. D. PRATT Center for Disease Control, US Public Health Service, Atlanta, Ga., USA-keys for the identification of vectors (Annex 1) ~ VT PREFACE The speed and frequency with which people travel and goods are transported between countries and continents has increased enormously during the last decade, and the trend is continuing. Accompanying this growth in international transportation, the risk of potentially harmful insects and rodents being carried from one area to another has also increased many times. The seriousness of the present situation and the possibility of even greater problems occurring in the future require that measures to prevent the dissemination of disease vectors should be intensified. The control of vectors in international seaports and airports requires international action and co­ operation. In this respect, the International Health Regulations adopted by the Twenty-second World Health Assembly in 1969 specify measures to ensure maximum security against the international spread of disease and vectors of disease. These measures, however, must be applied with a minimum of inter­ ference with traffic and the minimum discomfort to travellers. That most important phase of vector control, but one that is unfortunately often neglected, is control in and around seaports and airports. This should include all cargo-handling installations as well as the cargo itself. For all practical purposes, infestations of ships and aircraft are most likely to originate from ground installations and cargoes that are not vector-free. Vector control at the source would do much to prevent the transportation of vectors of disease and to meet the requirements of the International Health Regulations. To be most effective, control methods must be applied at the most vulnerable stage in the life cycle of the vector, and therefore accurate identifications and a good knowledge of the biology of the vector are needed. Surveillance and evaluation inspections must also be carried out to determine the action to be taken and to assess achievements and failures of control. The present manual on vector control in international health has been prepared in response to a recommendation of the Committee on Interna­ tional Quarantine meeting in March 1969. It is not possible to refer to all disease vectors in a manual of this kind, nor to describe all the techniques and their many variations used in control operations; emphasis has therefore been placed on insects and rodents associated with diseases that are of major concern in international health. The descriptions of fundamental principles and details should, however, enable staff with a sound basic training to organize control programmes capable of dealing adequately with other important vectors more local in their occurrence. This manual should provide vector control officers and team leaders with all the necessary information for the development and operation of vector control programmes in ground installations and aboard ships and aircraft. Since the manual covers a variety of highly specialized topics, experts in each field were in­ vited to provide material for the different chapters. The names of the contributors appear on p. VI. Dr J. V. Smith, Center for Disease Control, US Public Health Service, and Dr R. Pal, Vector Biology and Control, WHO, Geneva, co-ordinated the various contributions and acted as technical editors. Most of the figures in the manual have been reproduced from training guides of the Center for Disease Control (National Communicable Disease Center), US Public Health Service, but some of the photographs have been specially taken for the manual. The World Health Organization is indebted to all those who have given permission for their illustrations to be used and who have collaborated in various ways in the preparation of the text. -1- CHAPTER 1 VECTOR CONTROL IN PORTS AND AIRPORTS GENERAL Effective vector control measures are most important The immediate objective of a vector control pro­ in and around airports and seaports. Ideally, the ground gramme is the reduction of vector populations in a installations associated with international transporta­ given area; the long-term objective, whose importance tion should be in such excellent condition that they cannot be overemphasized, is their permanent elimina­ provide no suitable habitats for vectors. The attainment tion from the area. Each actual or potential vector of this goal, although difficult, is possible if determined habitat should first be thoroughly examined to deter­ and well-organized efforts are made. mine whether it is possible to render it permanently Both natural environments and man-made structures unsuitable for vectors. If it is not possible to make such provide habitats for various vectors. Sometimes, struc­ changes immediately, temporary control measures must tural design or details of construction permit rodents be used. Such measures are usually effective for only a to enter a building or give mosquitos access to cisterns, relatively short time and must be repeated periodically. but the multiplication of vectors in ground installations Both permanent and temporary control measures must more often occurs when port or airport authorities are be planned and undertaken as part of an overall vector unaware of what constitutes a suitable habitat, when control programme, and a detailed knowledge of the there is a lack of proper maintenance, when sanitation area involved and of the vectors found within it is arrangements are poor, and when there is indifference required. to proved control principles. ORGANIZATION The way in which a vector control programme is thorough if the unit is unencumbered by responsibility organized will depend on the nature and extent of the for control operations. Similarly, the operations unit vector problem and on the financial support that is will operate more efficiently and will be able to devote available. However, every control organization should its activities fully to vector control when the work has have a well-trained, intelligent, and imaginative leader been planned on the basis of previous surveys.