Public health implication and impact of climatic variables on the mosquitoes breeding in discarded tyres in an urban city of Nigeria

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to determine the influence of climatic variables on the composition of mosquito species breeding in disposed automobile tyre dumpsite in Mile One, Port Harcourt, River State. A descriptive cross-sectional design was adopted to evaluate vector dominance, distribution, species diversity and seasonal variation on the abundance of mosquitoes at the dumpsite. For larval sampling, hundred dips were randomly collected from 100 sampling tyres twice every week for seven months. Climatic data such as rainfall, temperature and humidity were collected from Nigerian Meteorological Agency, Port Harcourt Station. Inferential statistics such as diversity index, correlation, and regression analysis were carried out at 5% level of significance. Monthly collection revealed that June had the highest collection of larvae 1041 (28.55%), followed by July, 966 (26.49%) while 2532 adult mosquitoes emerged of which Ae. albopictus was the highest. Species dominance and richness was highest in males while females recorded the highest in terms of evenness and diversity (Shannon index). More so, the T-test statistic using the Shannon and Simpson index revealed that diversity is significantly different (p-value