Highland malaria in Ethiopia

Abebe Animut Ayele defenAbebe [1]ds on Friday 15 January 2016 his PhD degree at the University of Bergen with a dissertation:

“Anopheles species and malaria transmission risk in a highland area, south-central Ethiopia.” 

Anopheles arabiensis is the primary malaria vector in the lowlands of Ethiopia. In the highland Butajira area, a typical area of highland Ethiopia, the entomological aspects of the disease remain poorly described.

The study describes the entomological aspects of malaria transmission by highlighting on the abundance, host feeding preferences, entomological inoculation rates (EIRs) and risk of households’ exposure to malaria infectious Anopheles bites over two years. The study was done at three different altitudes ranging from 1800 to 2300 m.

Ten species of larval stages and nine species of adult stages of anophelines occurred in the area. The streams were the main breeding habitats of the anophelines. Anopheles arabiensis was the most prevalent species, and was found to feed on human and cattle with a similar preference. Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax infected Anopheles arabiensis and Plasmodium vivax infected Anopheles pharoensis were caught in the low- and mid-altitude villages. Also, houses with open eaves had higher density of malaria infectious Anopheles arabiensis.

Abebe Animut Ayele was born in 1968 in Gojjam in Ethiopia. He completed his bachelor’s degree in biology and his master’s degree in medical parasitology from Addis Ababa University where he works as a lecturer. He started his PhD training at the Centre for International Health, University of Bergen in 2008 with Professor Bernt Lindtjørn as main supervisor and Associate Professor Teshome Gebre-Michael as co-supervisor.

Abebe-coverThe thesis can be downloaded here 

The publications in his thesis include:

Animut A, Gebre-Michael T, Balkew M, Lindtjorn B. Abundance and dynamics of anopheline larvae in a highland malarious area of south-central Ethiopia. Parasit Vectors. 2012;5:117.

Animut A, Balkew M, Gebre-Michael T, Lindtjorn B. Blood meal sources and entomological inoculation rates of anophelines along a highland altitudinal transect in south-central Ethiopia. Malar J 2013; 12(1): 76.

Animut A, Balkew M, Lindtjorn B. Impact of housing condition on indoor-biting and indoor-resting Anopheles arabiensis density in a highland area, central Ethiopia. Malaria journal 2013;12(1):393.