IVCC is delighted to take part in the upcoming Annual Meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine & Hygiene (ASTMH) in Chicago, USA from 18th to 22nd October.

David McGuire, IVCC’s Director of Access and Market Shaping, will present an overview of vector control for malaria elimination during the Alan J. Magill Malaria Eradication Symposium: Using Vector Control to Advance Malaria Elimination, on Thursday 19th October, starting at 10:15* (Grand Ballroom CDEF – Ballroom Level (East Tower)).

Led by IVCC, the New Nets Project (NNP) piloted new tools to strengthen the insecticide-treated net (ITN) market. At ASTMH, NNP Partners** will present evaluations of new, insecticide-treated net products meta-analysis of observational studies, and economic evaluations from five sub-Saharan African settings.

Supported by IVCC, Project BITE*** (Bite Interruption Toward Elimination) aims to create a toolbox of vector control products to address malaria and other mosquito-borne diseases in the Indo-Pacific Region. Hear about the most recent project findings during Symposium 43 and hear about the latest thinking when it comes to locations where traditional epidemiological data, via a randomized controlled trial or other form of study, is not practical.

Other presentations will touch on a range of IVCC projects, see the full list below. There are poster presentations, as well as oral presentations.

Sessions:
148 – Malaria – Prevention I, October 22, 2023, 08:00 to 09:45, Grand Ballroom B – Ballroom Level (East Tower). Do Attractive Targeted Sugar Bait (ATSB) stations reduce malaria burden in Zambia? First results from a Phase III community-randomized efficacy trial of ATSB in Western Province, Zambia (Abstract #7201).

158 – Mosquitoes – Epidemiology and Vector Control I, October 22, 2023, 08:00 to 09:45, Regency Ballroom C – Ballroom Level (West Tower). The IVCC supported project, iDEM presents The impact of integrated vector management on the incidence of dengue in urban Malaysia: the iDEM cluster-randomized controlled trial (Abstract #7224, presented by Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine).

162 – Malaria Prevention II, October 22, 2023, 11:30 to 13:15, Grand Ballroom B – Ballroom Level (East Tower). We recommend the full symposia and highlight the talk by IVCC collaborator, Joshua Yukich at 13:00 on Evaluation of new, insecticide-treated net products, meta-analysis of observational studies, and economic evaluations from five sub-Saharan African settings (Abstract # 7242)

Symposia:
43 – Targeting “Gaps in Protection” to Prevent Malaria in Hard to Reach Communities: A Staged Approach to Test New Vector – Control Tools, and Insights Toward Future Evaluation, October 19, 2023, 15:00 to 16:45.

Posters:
5951: Residual bio-efficacy of Attractive Targeted Sugar Bait stations targeting malaria vectors during seasonal deployment in Western province, Zambia (presented by Macha Research Trust, Choma, Zambia, October 20, Riverside Centre – Exhibit Level (East Tower) and Grand Hall GHI)

Find out more about the 2023 Annual ASTMH Meeting online, including the full conference programme, details about keynote speakers, the event’s sponsors, and exhibitors.

*All times shown are given in Central Daylight Time (CDT), the local time zone (Chicago is GMT -5h).

** NNP implementation partners are: The Alliance for Malaria Prevention, Imperial College London, LSTM, LSTMH, PATH, PSI and Tulane University. NNP Industry partners are: BASF and DCT (Disease Control Technologies). NNP Funding partners are: Unitaid and The Global Fund. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, along with USAID are supporting partners.

***Project BITE partners are UCSF Global Health Group’s Malaria Elimination Initiative.

To celebrate World Mosquito Day, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation have produced a short information video about a potential new outdoor biting invention tool called Attractive Targeted Sugar Bait (ATSB®) which is being developed by Westham with support from IVCC as its funding partners including the Foundation. Watch the video below.

ATSB® project partners* are pleased to announce that the first of three large scale epidemiological studies have begun to support the opening of a new product class for vector control interventions which address the growing problem of outdoor biting mosquitoes.

Zambia was the first country to start this trial in November 2021 with more than 40,000 bait stations deployed in 35 clusters. A total of 2,450 children aged 1 to 14 years old are enrolled in this study which is expected to last two years.

Two similar studies will be conducted in Kenya and Mali starting in March and April 2022 which together with entomological, social science and cost-effectiveness analysis will constitute the data package which will be submitted to WHO to open the new product class and to regulatory authorities to seek approval for market deployment in sub-Saharan countries.

This is a major achievement following a decade of research and product development. In 2016 and 2017 large-scale proof-of-concept studies were conducted in Mali[1], which demonstrated a significant impact on mosquito density and survival. Since then, a manufacturing platform was established to produce enough ATSB® stations with an agreed specification and quality. Modelling based on preliminary results anticipates that a 2-3% daily feeding rate on ATSB® would lead to a 30% decrease in malaria incidence.

A large campaign of entomological trials was subsequently performed in Zambia, Kenya and Mali in 2020 and 2021 to assess daily feeding rates across diverse ecological settings and to confirm the ATSB bait station resilience when deployed in real field conditions, for example, when, exposed to rain, dust, wind and temperature variations.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, UK Aid and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) are co-funding the entomological and epidemiological impact evaluation of this new vector control tool.

How ATSB works

A significant trend that has emerged in recent years is the growing incidence of outdoor biting.  Mosquitoes are evolving, leading to biting earlier in the evening before people enter their houses to sleep under bed nets or biting after sunrise.  Changes in species composition and behaviour have also been observed towards the dominance of outdoor biting and resting species. This trend is also being exacerbated by changes in human behaviour, with more time being spent outside structures particularly early evening when vulnerable to outdoor biting, often driven by increased accessibility to electricity.

Female mosquitoes take blood meals for egg production, but mosquitoes from both genders must feed regularly and frequently on sugar for energy to survive. Common sources of sugar meals include plant tissue and floral nectar. Two ATSB® bait stations are placed on exterior walls of houses and lures the mosquitoes with an attractant which contains a sugar source laced with an insecticide.

Whilst vector control tools such as bed nets and indoor residual sprays have traditionally targeted indoor biting mosquitoes, there remains a significant gap in the malaria eradication toolbox for outdoor biting interventions.  ATSB®s have the potential to fill this important gap.

Note to Editors:

* Project partners are: Westham Co, IVCC, PATH, Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, University of Science, Technique and Technology of Bamako.

[1] https://malariajournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12936-020-3132-0

Featured image: ATSB station secured on the exterior wall of a structure. Credit PATH.