Potential risk of re-emergence of urban transmission of Yellow Fever virus in Brazil facilitated by competent Aedes populations

• Published in: Scientific reports Vol. 7; no. 1; pp. 4848 - 12
• Main Authors: Couto-Lima, Dinair, Madec, Yoann, Bersot, Maria Ignez, Campos, Stephanie Silva, Motta, Monique de Albuquerque, Santos, Flávia Barreto dos, Vazeille, Marie, Vasconcelos, Pedro Fernando da Costa, Lourenço-de-Oliveira, Ricardo, Failloux, Anna-Bella
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 07-07-2017; Nature Publishing Group; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 13/106; 14/1; 14/63; 38; 631/158/2178; 631/326/421; 64; Aquatic insects; Culicidae; Disease transmission; Epidemics; Fever; Humanities and Social Sciences; Life Sciences; Microbiology and Parasitology; Mosquitoes; multidisciplinary; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Vector-borne diseases; Viral diseases; Virology; South America; Brazil
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-05186-3

Yellow fever virus (YFV) causing a deadly viral disease is transmitted by the bite of infected mosquitoes. In Brazil, YFV is restricted to a forest cycle maintained between non-human primates and forest-canopy mosquitoes, where humans can be tangentially infected. Since late 2016, a growing number of human cases have been reported in Southeastern Brazil at the gates of the most populated areas of South America, the Atlantic coast, with Rio de Janeiro state hosting nearly 16 million people. We showed that the anthropophilic mosquitoes
Aedes aegypti
and
Aedes albopictus
as well as the YFV-enzootic mosquitoes
Haemagogus leucocelaenus
and
Sabethes albiprivus
from the YFV-free region of the Atlantic coast were highly susceptible to American and African YFV strains. Therefore, the risk of reemergence of urban YFV epidemics in South America is major with a virus introduced either from a forest cycle or by a traveler returning from the YFV-endemic region of Africa.