Experimental Field Station

Experimental Field Stations

CRID has 4 operational field experimental stations located in 4 regions in Cameroon :

Gounougou station (North Cameroon region: 9°05‘N; 13°40’E), where 12 huts were constructed in 2023 at gounougou, a village in the savannah zone about 4 km north of Lagdo district. The locality is made up of vast plains stretching out on either side of the Benoué river. The village, which extends for dozens of kilometres, covers vast flooded areas where irrigated rice is grown. The predominant vector in this area is coluzzii and An. funestus s.s., but also An. arabiensis and other local vectors such as An. pharoensis. An. coluzzii in the region are highly resistant to permethrin, deltamethrin and DDT.
Mibellon station (Adamaoua region), where 12 huts were constructed in 2016 at Mibellon, a rural village located in Bankim district. The village is located close to permanent water bodies, including a lake and swamps, which provide suitable breeding sites for mosquito development. gambiae s.l. and An. funestus s.l. are the two main malaria vectors found in the village, with An. funestus s.s. the most abundant throughout the year with a greater role in malaria transmission and display a high resistance intensity to all the pyrethroids which has led to a loss of efficacy of pyrethroid-based ITNs (Menze et al., 2016).
Mangoum station (West region: 5°29′09.2′′N, 10°35′20.8′′E), where 8 huts were constructed in 2023 in Mangoum, a rural village located in the Noun department. This locality is characterised by extensive manual and mechanised farming practices, producing spices, vegetables and cereals. gambiae is predominant in Mangoum, with mortality rates of less than 50% at 10× discriminatory doses of pyrethroids (Tepa et al., 2022).
Elende station (Centre region: 3°41′57.27′′N, 11°33′28.46′′E), where 8 huts were constructed in 2021 at Elende, a village in Mefou department, Nkolmefou I district. The village is about 2 km from Yaoundé’s Nsimalen International Airport and close to the Mefou River. The vegetation around the village is equatorial forest type. Elendé is highly endemic for malaria, mainly due to funestus s.s. followed by An. gambiae, and An. nili (Nkemngo et al., 2020).

The Architecture

The huts are built following the WHO recommended prototype for the West African region. These Experimental Huts were constructed on a concrete base of cement surrounded by a drainage channel to trap ants. The walls are made from concrete bricks and plastered inside and outside with a plaster made from a mixture of cement and sand. The roof is made from corrugated iron, and the ceiling is made from plywood. The four windows located on three sides of the hut are designed to create an angle with a 2cm gap, which will facilitate the entry of mosquitoes flying upward, thus, prevent the mosquitoes from escaping once they enter the hut. A veranda trap at the back of the hut according to WHO protocol a curtain was used as a separation between the veranda and the rest of the hut.

Use the station

Use the stations

The Station is used for small-scale field trials (phase II). The phase II studies in experimental huts aims at assessing the performance of bed nets in semi-natural conditions. This performance of long lasting insecticide net (LNs) against free-flying wild mosquitoes is evaluated in terms of inhibiting blood-feeding, deterring mosquitoes and inducing exophily and mortality.

Achievements

After meeting the requirements of phase I testing, the bed nets from several companies across the world have gone through the phase II testing in our experimental station. Our staff is well experienced with Phase 2 experimental hut trials. Using this experimental hut in Mibellon, we are able to assess the impact of insecticide resistance (Menze et al.,2020 ; Weedall et al.,2019 ; Mugenzi et al.,2020) on the effectiveness of vector control tools such as bed nets and indoor residual spray (IRS).

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