/ The Newsletter of the Florida Mosquito Control Association Volume 6, Issue Number 4 Julv/Aua 2006 1

South Carolina Mosquito Control Association

Annual Fall Meeting Nov 1 - 3, 2006

Ocean Creek Resort in Myrtle Beach, SC for further information, please contact

Carolyn Morgan (803) 896-0655 or ernail: rnoraanclCdhec.sc.aov

Florida Mosquito Control Association 2006 Fall Conference

NOV 12 - 16, 2006 Stuart, FL

Hutchison Island Marriot Beach Resort and Marina

www.floridarnosauito.orq

FMCA will host the 2007 AMCA Annual Meeting March 31 - April 5,2007

The first call for papers is posted on the AMCA website

General Session: htt~://www.mosauito.ora/meetinas/cf~-aenerai.as~x

Student Competition: htt~://www.mosauito.ora/meetinas/cf~-student.as~x

Latin America Session: htt~://www.rnosauito.ora/rneetinas/cf~-~atin.as~x

From the Editors of Wing Beats

Wing Beak is looking for interesting field-related or technical articles about mosquitoes, mosquito control, and related topics. The articles are usually 1-4 pages in length (including graphics and figures). A considerable amount of applied research, outreach, equipment modifications, and application technique changes being conducted at mosquito control programs, universities, and military installations throughout the world would be of interest to the Wing Beats readership. We encourage you to consider publishing in Wing Beats. Please send articles to: Dr. lack Petersen, JAMS PHEREC, 4000 Frankford Avenue, Panama City, FL 32405 or

News from FMEL

2007 Advanced Mosquito Identification & Certification Course

The 2007 Advanced Mosquito Identification and Certification Course will occur March 5 - 16, 2007. Registration will be open and the application will be posted on-line beginning August 15, 2006 at htt~://mosauito.ifas.ufl.edu

News from PHEREC

Petersen Receives Outstanding Faculty A ward

Dr. John "lack" L. Petersen is the 2006 recipient of the newly established PHEREC Outstanding Faculty Award. The award was created in recognition of exceptional job performance based on: grantsmanship; publication; workshop/symposiurn organization; presentations; committee activity; public outreach; web page management; exhibit development; and, PHEREC staff vote. Dr. Petersen received a certificate and a $1,000 budget bonus. His name will also be engraved on a plaque recognizing award winners located in the foyer of the PHEREC administration building. Congratulations lack!

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Recognize the individuals who have made outstanding contributions to Mosquito Control: Nominate them for the 2006 FMCA Awards!

Any Florida Mosquito Control Association member in good standing may nominate a candidate for any award by submitting supporting information to the Awards Committee, to include a short biographical sketch of the nominee, emphasizing those accomplishments deemed worthy o f the award. There is no official nomination form. Endorsements and written support from other colleagues are encouraged. All submissions will be acknowledged.

The Maurice W. Provost Memorial Award, established as a memorial to the first Director of the Florida Medical Entomology Laboratory, honors persons who have made outstanding contributions to mosquito control and/or biting fly biology in Florida. Candidates must have been instrumental in each of the following areas: developing sound management and operational methods to reduce pesticide levels and to minimize habitat alteration while reducing mosquito populations; increasing our knowledge of mosquitoes and other biting insects and their habitats; and educating students and the general public about the importance of various environmental issues facing the citizens in protecting the fauna and flora in Florida. The candidate should be a FMCA member and have made significant contributions to the Association. Nominators must include a short biographical sketch of the nominee emphasizing the accomplishments deemed worthy of the award. Endorsements and written support from other colleagues are encouraged.

The Joseph Y. Porter Distinguished Achievement Award, which honors the first President of the F!orida Anti-Mosquito Association and first State Health Officer of Florida, recognizes scientists who have made significant contributions to entomology, with special emphasis on the abatement of arthropods of public health importance. The candidate must have meritoriously contributed to the advancement of entomology research in the field of mosquito and/or other biting arthropod control in the State of Florida. The candidate should be a FMCA member and have made significant contributions to the Association. Nominators must inclcde a short biographical sketch of the nominee emphasizing the accomplishments deemed worthy of the award. Endorsements and written support from other colleagues are encouraged.

The Fred Stutz Memorial Award, which honors the former director of the Dade County Mosquito Control office, recognizes outstandlug contributions to mosquito control by development of procedures that increase effectiveness in

mosquito and/or other arthropod control, or the design and manufacture of equipment that helped revolutionize the control of mosquitoes and/or other arthropods of public health importance. The candidate should be a FMCA member and have made significant contributions to the Association. Nominators must include a short biographical sketch of the nominee including an evaluation and appraisal of the nominee's accomplishments. Endorsements and written support from other colleagues are encouraged.

The FMCA Merit Award recognizes outstanding individual contributions in promoting control of disease-transmitting and pestiferous mosquitoes or other arthropods of public health importance, for scientific advancement of the discipline, or for developing or extending the public interest in the control of such mosquitoes or other arthropods. The candidate should represent those characteristics generally associated with responsible leadership, good citizenship and personal integrity. The candidate should be a FMCA member and have made significant contributions to the Association. Nominators must include a short biographical sketch of the nominee emphasizing the accomplishments deemed worthy of the award. Endorsements and written support from other colleagues are encouraged.

The James W. Robinson Memorial Award was estab!ished in 2005 as a memorial to Jim Robinson, Director of the Pasco County Mcsquito Control District, who was renowned for his innovative development of new equipment aiid adoption of new technologies. This award recognizes innovation and ingenuity in optimizing the safe and efficient operations of Florida public health pest control programs, The candidate must have contributed an outstanding improvement to equipment or tecnniques used by a non-commercial ~nosquito control re!ated agexy . This advancement sliould not be proprietary ir, nature, and must be freely shared with the Association. The recipient of the lames W Robinson Memorial Award will receive $500 cash, a commemorative certificate, and funding to attend the Annual Fall Meeting. Nominators must include a short biographical sketch of the

nominee emphasizing the accomplishments deemed worthy o f the award. Endorsements and written support from other colleagues are encouraged.

The Sherrie Yarberry Award, named for a dedicated employee of the Jacksonville Mosquito Control office, recognizes continued outstanding contributions to operational program activities by veteran, non- administrative personnel of Florida mosquito control related agencies. The candidate must demonstrate exemplary performance resulting in enhanced unit efficiency o r public recognition of excellence of the parent organization. The recipient of the Sherrie Yarberry Award will receive $500 cash, a commemorative certificate, and funding t o attend

the Annual Fall Meeting. Nominators must include a short biographical sketch o f the nominee emphasizing the accomplishments deemed worthy of the award. Endorsements and written support from other colleagues are encouraged.

Send vour nominations and supportina materials on or before Tuesday. Auaust 15, 2006 to:

Stephen Sickerman, FDACS Bureau of Entomology and Pest Control 3920 Frankford Avenue Panama City, FL 32405-1953 phone 850-872-4250 fax 850-872-4271 sickers@doacs.state.fl.us

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JOB ANNOUNCEMENTS

Lee County Mosquito Control District

Position of District Director

The Board of Cornmissloners of the Lee County Mosquito Control District will receive applications for the position of Director of the District up to 4:00 p.m., Friday, September 29, 2006.

Minimum qualifications include a four year college degree in engineering, entomology or one of the biological sciences acceptable to the Board. Duties include administration of District programs under the authority of the Board of Commissioners.

Compensation is based upon knowledge and experience of the applicant, and will be determined solely by the Board.

Applications may be submitted by letter, addressed to the Board of Commissioners, Lee County Mosquito Control District, and may be sent by mail to Post Office Box 60005, Fort Myers, FL 33906, or hand delivered to the office of the District, 15191 Homestead Road, Lehigh Acres, FL 33971. A full resume should be submitted detailing the applicant's qualifications and experience in mosquito control activities.

Volusia County Mosquito Control

Environmental Specialist I Public Works Services

Supervisor

Environmental Specialist I: Pay Range $30,000-$47,000 Major functions: mosquito & midge surveillance, control & education.

Minimum qualifications: Bachelor of Science in Biology, Entomology, Environmental Science or related field. A comparable amount of education, training or experience for the minimum education. Possession of a valid Florida Driver's License.

Public Works Services Supervisor: Pay Range $42,000-$67,000 Major functions: Planning, organizing, & supervision in Mosquito Control division. Review operational procedures. Assist in preparing annual budget. Perform field inspections of projects.

Minimum qualifications: Bachelor's Degree in Business, Engineering or closely related field and three (3) years progressively responsible experience in project management or similar work; or graduation from high school or possession of GED and seven (7) years increasingly responsible experience, five (5) years at level of supervisor.

To inquire or apply for either position at Volusia County Mosquito Control, contact: lonas Stewart, 1600 Aviation Center Parkway, Daytona Beach, FL 32114; 386- 239-6516; jstewart@co.volusia.fl.us

Citrus County Mosquito Control District

Position of Director

The Board of Commissioners of the Citrus Countv Mosouito Control District is seeking applications for the position of Director. The applicant must have a minimum of a Bachelor's degree in entomology, basic sciences, engineering, pest control or a closely related field with a minimum of four years work experience in mosquito control.

This position requires the applicant to have or be able to obtain public health pest control certification, director's certification and a current Florida driver's license. Salary commensurate with applicant's experience and ability. Mail or fax cover letter and resume to Citrus County Mosquito Control District. Applications will be taken until the position is filled.

Citrus County Mosquito Control District, P.O. Box 153, Lecanto, FL 34460; Phone: 352-527- 7478; Fax: 352-527-9567

Florida Mosquito Control Association, Inc. FIRST CALL FOR PAPERS

2006 ANNUAL FALL MEETING Hutchinson Is land Resort, 555 NE Ocean Boulevard, Stuart, FL 34996

772.225.3700 November 12 - 15, 2006

You are invited to submit a tit le for a paper t o be presented a t the 2006 Annual Fall Meeting of the Florida Mosquito Control Association, Inc. to be held a t the Hutchinson Island Resort on Hutchinson Island in Stuart, FL, November 12 - 15, 2006. Type the title, author(s), organization(s), and address (es) exactly the way they are to appear on the program. I f more than one author is listed, place an asterisk after the name of the author who is to present the paper. Send th is form t o Bi l l Reynolds, ADAPCO, Inc., 2800 South Financial Court, Sanford, FL, 32773-8118, E-mail: brevnolds@mvadaoco.com, Telephone: 407.330.4800; FAX: 866.330.9888. Please submit as soon as possible so there is t ime t o plan and organize the program.

TITLE:

AUTHOR: (INCLUDE E-MAIL, TELEPHONE AND FAX NUMBERS OF PRESENTER)

ORGANIZATION:

3.

MAILING ADDRESS:

REQUESTED DURATION OF PRESENTATION: 10 min 15 min Symposium Other

AUDIO/VISUAL EQUIPMENT REQUIRED: S l i d e L~~~ Overhead Other (please specify)

PAPER CATEGORY: -- Research - Operations Regulatory - Other (please specify)

Mosquito Surveillance and West Nile Prediction: Lessons Learned

The article "West Nile virus surveillance in mosquitoes in New York State, 2000-2004" (Lukacik, e t al. 1. Am. Mosq. Control Assoc. 22: 264-271) summarizes the mosquito surveillance program in New York State (NYS) from 2000-2004 based on sampling ca. 1.1 million mosquitoes that were tested for West Nile virus (WNV). By anyone's standards the testing of 35,280 mosquito pools for WNV using QPCR was a prodigious effort. What important lessons were learned that could benefit the Florida surveillance programs?

I recently heard of a White House staff member, Stuart Baker, who is the White House Director for Lessons Learned. I kid you not - he is Director of Lessons Learned with an annual salary o f $106,641. Perhaps Mr. Baker is the person to evaluate different mosquito surveillance efforts for lessons learned.

The report in IAMCA points out several findings about the NYS WNV mosquito surveillance program. During the five years of the study, NYS detected 814 WNV positive mosquito pools representing 10 mosquito species. Culex pipiens/restuans pools account for ca. 91% of the WNV positives, while the Culex represented ca. 48% of the numbers tested. What did all the work show? Were the mosquito pools and sampling useful i n predicting WNV outbreaks in New York? I submit this is the most important issue for Fior~da since we are well past the need to "detect the presence" o f WNV.

The annual numbers of human cases in NYS ranged between 10 and 83 annually. Most of the mosquito pools were from what the authors define as the epicenter for WNV in NYS where it first appeared in i999. This also happens to contain New York's 12 most populous counties. I f one takes into account the population size of NYS (ca. 20 million people), and the population sizes o f the few focal areas, the incidence of West Nile in NYS is low and certainly below many western states and outbreaks in the mid ,west U.S. Finellas County and Coconut Grove, Florida, had much higher incidences of WNV. So did mosquito testing provide information to predict the risk to humans in NYS?

Elsewhere Roxanne Rutledge has discussed the goals of mosquito surveillance (see Rutledge C. R. 2003. Mosquito Pooling: Getting a return on your investment. BuzzWords, 3(3): 8-91 and many BuzzWords coiumns have discussed the importance and utility o f a well run sentinel chicken survei!lance program for WNV surveillance as is done in many parts of Florida [Tabachnick and Day. 2001. BuzzWords l (6) : 8-9; l~abachnick. 2004. Buzzwords 4(1): 7-53; Tabachnick. 2004. Buzzwords 4(2): 10-12; Tabachnick e t al. 2005. Buzzwords 5(2):6]

The information reported for NYS is illustrative of what can be learned about predicting human risk for WNV from such data. For example, the authors report that between ZOO0 arid 2004, 82.8% of counties had a human case of LVMV during a year it conducted virus surveillance! I s there a lesson here? Another reported finding is that of the 100 WNV human cases in these counties, 92O/~ (n=92j occurred in a county conducting virus surveillance, with 77% (n=77) reporting a positive WNV pool 1 month before disease onset. I guess this means that of the 92 WNV positive humans, 77 were preceded by a positive mosquito poo!, which also means that 15 human cases were not preceded by a mosquito pool despite the testing. BuzzWnrds readers should by now also be well aware that there are many, many areas of the 0. S., including NYS, where the first WNV positive mosquito pool was not followed by a West Nile human case. Are these data useful to differentiate human risk? Can these data be used to predict a "big event?"

Some other findings are provided including: gravid traps were bettar a t obtaining 1VNV positive pools than CDC light traps, even when baited with COz, supporting previousiy published reports: and C. pipensfrestuans are the primary WNV vectors in NYS supporting previously published repolts. The report also fulfills one of the goals of the NYS system which was to provide "r~ecessary surveillance-based evidence of WNV presence since 2000." Readers need to continue t o judge the util ity and usefulness of such a prodigious effort to assess human risk. The authors of the report admit that the low numbers o i human cases in NYS make it very difficult to use these data t o predict human cases. However they believe that the program needs t o become even timelier in reporting this information, and t i a t these data can be used to identify geographic areas of increased risk, particularly when used with other data f rom atiian, mammal and passive human surveillance. The authors recommend that improvements in infrastructure in NYS to handle larger number-s of mosquitoes is needed.

What can Florida learn from this report? Are there some lessons here for Florida?

It is apparent and widely known by Florida's mosquito and public health professionals that sentinei chicken surveillance as done in Florida has not found much use in many U. S. states, which like NYS have invested heavily in WNV surveillance using mosquito pools. There are many reasons for this including the perception that sentinel chickens do not work in these states. There is no published scientific support for this belief, and indeed there is not even a scientifically testable reason why this should be so. Some are also still confused about the difference between detection and surveillance to assess risk. Despite this issue, let's evaluate the amount of effort being expended in NYS and Florida on surveillance. NYS tested 1.2 million mosquitoes and the results from this effort are those reported above.

How many sentinel chickens would be needed over 5 years to obtain WNV surveillance data comparable to NYS? The results from mosquito testing would not provide the same information as sentinel chicken testing because, after all, we all recognize that mosquito infection data is only infection, and of course does not necessarily translate into actual mosquito transmission. Indeed the NYS data has the further caveat that the mosquito pools were tested using QPCR so that even some of the pools may not have been detecting live or "infectious" virus. There is no doubt that a sentinel chicken seroconversion represents an actual transmission event. All one needs to know, as we have stressed before in several previous Buzzwords, is some estimate on the number of mosquitoes actually being drawn to the chickens. We know this can vary widely, and of course one does not place sentinei flocks routinely in areas where

they will not or cannot be exposed to mosquitoes. One wonders how some of the sentinels were placed, and just what the tests using sentinel chickens in some other areas of the U. S. were trying to determine. However, for arguments let's say on average Florida's sentinei chickens receive 1000 bites per sampling period, whether this is every 1 week or 2 weeks. We can debate an actual number of mosquitoes per sentinel, and it will vary, but for purposes of discussion let's just say 1000 which to me is actually realistic. Then we should look at some year round programs and again let's consider they bleed the chickens either

every week or every other week. Here are some estimates for 4 different mosquito control districts:

The above shows that 4 Florida counties effectively sample more mosquitoes in 1 year than NYS did in 5 years. Even if one reduces the estimates of the mosquitoes by 10-fold, clearly these 4 counties exceed NYS's efforts. Even with a 100-fold change in the mosquitoes sampled, these 4 counties are comparable to all of NYS's efforts. I n sum there is simply no comparison between the entire state of Florida's WNV surveillance programs and the considerable effort in NYS. Florida's Tampa laboratory would process ca 7800 serum samples annually for antibody for the listed counties if testing biweekly. Certainly Florida's plan is to let the chickens do most of the work!

The goal of Florida's surveillance program is not to detect the presence of WNV as apparently was one of the NYS goals. Florida is well past the need to detect WNV presence. Florida's goals are to get information to assess and differentiate human risk, identify high risk areas and predict a "big event" in advance. Florida recognizes that sporadic isolated human cases are a random chance event that is not entirely predictable in time or space. Florida's surveillance programs assess the transmission of many, many more mosquitoes. The sentinei chicken data assesses wide spread areas enhancing the ability to pick up focal outbreaks as occurred in Pinellas County in 2005. It provides direct assessment of transmission frequency, not "infection" rates. Certainly one might use mosquito infection surveillance to get focal data in those high risk areas identified by the sentinel chickens. Currently in Baton Rouge,

Deadline for submissions to be included in the Sept/Oct 2006 issue of Buzz Words is October 6, 2006. Please send articles and change of address information to: Dr. Roxanne

Rutledge, Editor, FMEL, 200 gth Street S.E., Vero Beach, FL 32962 or buzzwordslifas.ufl.edu

Louisiana, where there is certainly high transmission, the mosquito pools are showing rates approaching 1511000. These data are useful, but so would sentinel chicken surveillance be useful in Baton Rouge at less cost, provide wider coverage, and if done properly, sampling more mosquitoes.

Florida's choice here is clear. How much does one invest in the different types of WNV surveillance? What resources should be devoted to mosquito surveillance, sentinel chickens, wild avians, mammals, passive human? I s processing 35,000 mosquito pools using PCR a desirable useful goal as a wide spread WNV sentinel surveillance program?

Lukacik, et al. (2006) have amply demonstrated the advantages and disadvantages of mosquito surveillance for WNV to assess human risk. Florida needs to stay focused on the goals of surveillance for WNV and use its available resources wisely. Rather than expand resources to increase widespread mosquito surveillance for WNV, Florida should evaluate the costs of a widespread, large WNV mosquito surveillance compared to Florida's sentinel chicken surveillance program. I suggest that Florida use its resources to expand the areas being covered and increase the timeliness of reporting sentinel chicken data.

Walter 3. Tabachnick Director, Florida Medical Entomology Laboratory Department of Entomology and Nematology University of Florida/IFAS

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