The Ministry of The Environment and Housing and the Department of Environmental Health Services in conjunction with The Caribbean Public Health Agency (CARPHA) and the European Union hosted a training session which aimed to build Insecticide Resistance Testing capacity in CARPHA Member States and strengthen health systems ability to respond to vector-borne outbreaks such as Zika, Chickunguna and Dengue Fever.

The training was facilitated by Ms. Jenna Indarsingh a European Union Consultant and Mr. Rajesh Ragoo Senior Technical Officer at CARPHA and was hosted at the Department of Environmental Health Services, Administrative Office July 2 – 6, 2018. The participants included ten (10) members of the Vector Control Unit and Health Inspectors in the Department of Environmental Health Services.

The focus of the visit was is to strengthen vector control of medically important species of mosquitoes by:

Providing training in advanced entomological techniques to support IRT, at the end of which, draft national guidelines for an IRT programme was developed and implemented:

 The training was interactive consisting of lectures, discussions, experiments, exploring regional and local techniques and perspectives in vector management and entomological surveillance.  Problems associated with record keeping and strategies to address insecticide resistance and ovi-trapping of mosquitoes were resolved.

A priority of the workshop was access the country’s capacity to conduct IRTfor important public health species such as Aedes aegypti. Insecticide Resistance refers to a decrease in the effectiveness of an insecticide to effectively kill the target species. This means that although the agency is conducting treatment; for example fogging exercise there is no reduction in the mosquito population because they have developed a resistance to the insecticide used. Officer are learning to conduct assessments to determine if there is resistance to the insecticides applied to the various stages of the mosquito life cycle larvae, pupae or adult.

The training accessed the country’s infrastructure and facilities for conducting IRT and evaluated the technical competency for conducting IRT.   It also assisted in the development of country specific national guidelines for IRT for vectors of public health importance with emphasis on mosquitoes.  Officers received training in advanced ovi-trapping techniques to support IRT. All participants l received participation certificates.

Mr. Ragoo and Ms. Indarsingh make presentations at the Department of Environmental Health Services