Estimating the impact of Tiny Targets in reducing the incidence of Gambian sleeping sickness in the North-west Uganda focus

Bessell, Paul R., Esterhuizen, Johan, Lehane, Mike, Longbottom, Joshua, Mugenyi, Albert, Selby, Richard, Tirados, Inaki ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9771-4880, Torr, Steve ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9550-4030, Waiswa, Charles, Wamboga, Charles and Hope, Andrew (2021) 'Estimating the impact of Tiny Targets in reducing the incidence of Gambian sleeping sickness in the North-west Uganda focus'. Parasites & Vectors, Vol 14, Issue 410.

Preview

Text s13071-021-04889-x.pdf - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (4MB) | Preview

Abstract

Background
Riverine species of tsetse (Glossina) transmit Trypanosoma brucei gambiense, which causes Gambian human African trypanosomiasis (gHAT), a neglected tropical disease. Uganda aims to eliminate gHAT as a public health problem through detection and treatment of human cases and vector control. The latter is being achieved through the deployment of ‘Tiny Targets’, insecticide-impregnated panels of material which attract and kill tsetse. We analysed the spatial and temporal distribution of cases of gHAT in Uganda during the period 2010–2019 to assess whether Tiny Targets have had an impact on disease incidence.

Methods
To quantify the deployment of Tiny Targets, we mapped the rivers and their associated watersheds in the intervention area. We then categorised each of these on a scale of 0–3 according to whether Tiny Targets were absent (0), present only in neighbouring watersheds (1), present in the watersheds but not all neighbours (2), or present in the watershed and all neighbours (3). We overlaid all cases that were diagnosed between 2000 and 2020 and assessed whether the probability of finding cases in a watershed changed following the deployment of targets. We also estimated the number of cases averted through tsetse control.

Results
We found that following the deployment of Tiny Targets in a watershed, there were fewer cases of HAT, with a sampled error probability of 0.007. We estimate that during the intervention period 2012–2019 we should have expected 48 cases (95% confidence intervals = 40–57) compared to the 36 cases observed. The results are robust to a range of sensitivity analyses.

Conclusions
Tiny Targets have reduced the incidence of gHAT by 25% in north-western Uganda.

Item Type:	Article
Subjects:	QX Parasitology > QX 4 General works QX Parasitology > Insects. Other Parasites > QX 505 Diptera WA Public Health > Preventive Medicine > WA 110 Prevention and control of communicable diseases. Transmission of infectious diseases WA Public Health > Health Problems of Special Population Groups > WA 395 Health in developing countries WC Communicable Diseases > Tropical and Parasitic Diseases > WC 705 Trypanosomiasis
Faculty: Department:	Biological Sciences > Vector Biology Department
Digital Object Identifer (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.1186/s13071-021-04889-x
Depositing User:	Samantha Sheldrake
Date Deposited:	20 Aug 2021 15:11
Last Modified:	20 Aug 2021 15:11
URI:	https://archive.lstmed.ac.uk/id/eprint/18715

Statistics

View details

Actions (login required)

Edit Item