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Abstract
Adult female Anopheles mosquitoes attracted to man were collected twice a month (December 2003-January 2005) from communities located in tropical rain forest region of Ikenne and Remo North Local Government Areas of Ogun State, Nigeria. The collection was made on Human volunteers from indoor and outdoor between 1900-0600h following WHO (1975) standard procedure. A total of 1500 Anopheline mosquitoes were collected and identified using both morphological and molecular techniques. This constitutes 790 An. gambiae (52.7%), 555 An.arabiensis (37%), and 155 An. funestus group (10.3%). The indoor catch 807(53.8%) predominated over the outdoors 693(46.2%) which constitute mainly of An. rivulorum and An. arabiensis. The biting activity observed indoor was significantly higher than outdoor (P<0.05) with a ratio of 10.1: 9.60, indoor to outdoor. Although, there was no significant difference in the seasonal biting activity (P>0.01), the mosquito species that fed exclusively on man were significantly higher than those with mixed blood (P< 0.05). The implicated malaria vectors were An. arabiensis, An.gambiae s. s. and An. funestus s. s. with overall infection rates of 2.3%, 2.5% and 2.9% respectively. This study emphasizes the need for accurate identification of Anopheles mosquitoes attracted to man in order to determine vector-host contact necessary for malaria transmission and to provide information required to formulate vector control programme.
Keywords: Anopheles mosquitoes, PCR identification, ELISA test, malaria, Nigeria,