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‘Where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of Tiny Targets to control tsetse in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

The National Programme for the control of human African trypanosomiasis in Democratic Republic of Congo includes a large-scale vector control operation using Tiny Targets. These are small panels of insecticide-impregnated cloth that are deployed in riverine habitat where tsetse flies concentrate. Th...

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Autores principales: Vander Kelen, Catiane, Mpanya, Alain, Hasker, Epco, Miaka, Erick, Nzuzi, Ruth, Torr, Steve, Perez, Dennis, Pulford, Justin
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BMJ Publishing Group 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8739071/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34992076
http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2021-006879
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author Vander Kelen, Catiane
Mpanya, Alain
Hasker, Epco
Miaka, Erick
Nzuzi, Ruth
Torr, Steve
Perez, Dennis
Pulford, Justin
author_facet Vander Kelen, Catiane
Mpanya, Alain
Hasker, Epco
Miaka, Erick
Nzuzi, Ruth
Torr, Steve
Perez, Dennis
Pulford, Justin
author_sort Vander Kelen, Catiane
collection PubMed
description The National Programme for the control of human African trypanosomiasis in Democratic Republic of Congo includes a large-scale vector control operation using Tiny Targets. These are small panels of insecticide-impregnated cloth that are deployed in riverine habitat where tsetse flies concentrate. The effectiveness of Tiny Targets depends partly on acceptance by local communities. In 2018, we conducted research to explore the perception and acceptability of Tiny Targets in two different village clusters where Tiny Targets had been deployed by the local community or external teams. We conducted fourteen focus group discussions and seven semistructured interviews in three villages from each cluster in the Yasa Bonga health zone. Our findings showed that acceptability was better in the cluster where communities were involved in the deployment of Tiny Targets. Also in this cluster, awareness about Tiny Targets was satisfactory and the project was implemented within local customs, which promoted a positive perception of Tiny Targets and their benefits. In the cluster where external teams deployed Tiny Targets, a lack of information and communication, stereotypes applied by communities towards the deployment teams and the impression of inadequate respect for local customs led to anxiety and a misleading interpretation of the purpose of Tiny Targets and negatively influenced acceptability. This study highlights the importance of involving communities for programme acceptance. Our research underlined how awareness campaigns and communication are essential, but also how working within the scope of community social norms and customs are equally important. Prospects for the successful use of Tiny Targets are greater when communities are involved because the use can be adapted to social norms.
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spelling pubmed-87390712022-01-20 ‘Where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of Tiny Targets to control tsetse in the Democratic Republic of the Congo Vander Kelen, Catiane Mpanya, Alain Hasker, Epco Miaka, Erick Nzuzi, Ruth Torr, Steve Perez, Dennis Pulford, Justin BMJ Glob Health Original Research The National Programme for the control of human African trypanosomiasis in Democratic Republic of Congo includes a large-scale vector control operation using Tiny Targets. These are small panels of insecticide-impregnated cloth that are deployed in riverine habitat where tsetse flies concentrate. The effectiveness of Tiny Targets depends partly on acceptance by local communities. In 2018, we conducted research to explore the perception and acceptability of Tiny Targets in two different village clusters where Tiny Targets had been deployed by the local community or external teams. We conducted fourteen focus group discussions and seven semistructured interviews in three villages from each cluster in the Yasa Bonga health zone. Our findings showed that acceptability was better in the cluster where communities were involved in the deployment of Tiny Targets. Also in this cluster, awareness about Tiny Targets was satisfactory and the project was implemented within local customs, which promoted a positive perception of Tiny Targets and their benefits. In the cluster where external teams deployed Tiny Targets, a lack of information and communication, stereotypes applied by communities towards the deployment teams and the impression of inadequate respect for local customs led to anxiety and a misleading interpretation of the purpose of Tiny Targets and negatively influenced acceptability. This study highlights the importance of involving communities for programme acceptance. Our research underlined how awareness campaigns and communication are essential, but also how working within the scope of community social norms and customs are equally important. Prospects for the successful use of Tiny Targets are greater when communities are involved because the use can be adapted to social norms. BMJ Publishing Group 2022-01-06 /pmc/articles/PMC8739071/ /pubmed/34992076 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2021-006879 Text en © Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2022. Re-use permitted under CC BY. Published by BMJ. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the licence is given, and indication of whether changes were made. See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Original Research
Vander Kelen, Catiane
Mpanya, Alain
Hasker, Epco
Miaka, Erick
Nzuzi, Ruth
Torr, Steve
Perez, Dennis
Pulford, Justin
‘Where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of Tiny Targets to control tsetse in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
title ‘Where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of Tiny Targets to control tsetse in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
title_full ‘Where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of Tiny Targets to control tsetse in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
title_fullStr ‘Where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of Tiny Targets to control tsetse in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
title_full_unstemmed ‘Where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of Tiny Targets to control tsetse in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
title_short ‘Where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of Tiny Targets to control tsetse in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
title_sort ‘where are the dead flies!’: perceptions of local communities towards the deployment of tiny targets to control tsetse in the democratic republic of the congo
topic Original Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8739071/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34992076
http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2021-006879
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