Prevalence of <i>Dirofilaria immitis</i> in mosquitoes (Diptera) – systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract

Knowledge of the vectors of dirofilariasis in the world beside the treatment of infected dog is crucial to establish mosquito vector-based control programs. The current systematic review and meta-analysis were conducted on published studies, documenting the prevalence of <i>Dirofilaria immitis</i> infected/infective mosquitoes from field surveys and laboratory experiments under controlled conditions. Articles up through 2019 from Scopus, PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, Google Scholar were screened systematically. The overall prevalence of <i>D. immitis</i> infected/infective mosquitoes was estimated using a random effect model. Meta-regression was used to identify factors related to high dirofilariasis prevalence in the vectors. In these studies, the detection method was not identified as a heterogeneity and the overall prevalence in both subgroups had overlap (7.9-34.9 and 1.5-48.5). The overall prevalence of infective stage was 2.6 (95% CI: 0.97-4.77 per 1,000) and 84.7 per 1000 (95% CI: 20.5-183.8 per 1,000) for the field survey/laboratory experiment, respectively. The higher overall prevalence of <i>D. immitis</i> infected/infective mosquitoes were reported across studies in which take place in Eastern Mediterranean Region office (EMRO), longitude: 80 to 110, latitude: 20 to 40, annual rainfall: 250 to 1000, sea level: 26 to 100 and <1,000, humidity: 66 to 70, during 2000 to 2005 by dissection methods. Our review determined that mosquito species within the genus <i>Anopheles</i> and to a less extent <i>Culex</i> were the main vectors of dirofilariasis.