Intricacies of using temperature of different niches for assessing impact on malaria transmission

BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVES: The influence of temperature on the life cycle of mosquitoes as well as on development of malaria parasite in mosquitoes is well studied. Most of the studies use outdoor temperature for understanding the transmission dynamics and providing projections of malaria. As the mosquitoes breed in water and rest usually indoors, it is logical to relate the transmission dynamics with temperature of micro-niche. The present study was, therefore, undertaken to understand the influence of different formats of temperature of different micro-niches on transmission of malaria for providing more realistic projections. METHODS: The study was conducted in one village each of Assam and Uttarakhand States of India. Temperatures recorded from outdoor (air) as well as indoor habitats (resting place of mosquito) were averaged into daily, fortnightly and monthly and were used for determination of transmission windows (TWs) for Plasmodium vivax (Pv) and P. falciparum (Pf) based on minimum temperature threshold required for transmission. RESULTS: The daily temperature was found more useful for calculation of sporogony than fortnightly and monthly temperatures. Monthly TWs were further refined using fortnightly temperature, keeping in view the completion of more than one life cycle of malaria vectors and sporogony of malaria parasite in a month. A linear regression equation was generated to find out the relationship between outdoor and indoor temperatures and R(2) to predict the percentage of variation in indoor temperature as a function of outdoor temperature at both localities. INTERPRETATION & CONCLUSIONS: The study revealed that the indoor temperature was more than outdoors in stable malarious area (Assam) but fluctuating in low endemic area like Uttarakhand. Transmission windows of malaria should be determined by transforming outdoor data to indoor and preferably at fortnightly interval. With daily recorded temperature, sporogonic and gonotrophic cycles can also be calculated which is otherwise not possible with monthly data. The study highlights that the projections made for malaria in view of climate change need to be seen with limitation of difference in outdoor and indoor temperatures at different locations, highlighting the need for local data generation at least at sub-district level.