There is growing interest in the scientific community, health ministries, and other organizations to control and eventually eliminate neglected tropical diseases (NTDs). Control efforts require reliable maps of NTD distribution estimated from appropriate models and survey data on the number of infected people among those examined at a given location. This kind of data is often available in the literature as part of epidemiological studies. However, an open-access database compiling location-specific survey data does not yet exist.

In the Indian subcontinent, about 200 million people are at risk of developing visceral leishmaniasis (VL). In 2005, the governments of India, Nepal and Bangladesh started the first regional VL elimination program with the aim to reduce the annual incidence to less than 1 per 10,000 by 2015. A mathematical model was developed to support this elimination program with basic quantifications of transmission, disease and intervention parameters. This model was used to predict the effects of different intervention strategies.

Aedes aegypti (Linnaeus) and Aedes albopictus Skuse mosquitoes transmit serious human arboviral diseases including yellow fever, dengue and chikungunya in many tropical and sub-tropical countries. Females of the two species have adapted to undergo preimaginal development in natural or artificial collections of freshwater near human habitations and feed on human blood. While there is an effective vaccine against yellow fever, the control of dengue and chikungunya is mainly dependent on reducing freshwater preimaginal development habitats of the two vectors. We show here that Ae.

Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) cause significant physical debilitation, lowered economic productivity, and social ostracism for afflicted individuals. Five NTDs with available preventive chemotherapy: lymphatic filariasis (LF), trachoma, schistosomiasis, onchocerciasis and the three soil-transmitted helminths (STH); have been targeted for control or elimination, but resource constraints in endemic countries have impeded progress toward these goals.

In the 1930s, Brigadier Sinton, a highly decorated doctor of the British Indian Army, and a pioneer in the field of malaria control in India, said 'the very problem of survival in India seems to be that of malaria'. Almost 8 decades later, we seem to be no better! At the time of India's independence, malaria was responsible for an estimated 75 million cases and 0.8 million deaths annually.

In January, entomologists will start deploying a strange bacterium called Wolbachia pipientis in an attempt to halt disease transmission by mosquitoes. Their target is Aedes aegypti, the mosquito that transmits dengue, a human viral disease that causes crippling joint and muscle pains. Recent studies have shown that infection with Wolbachia makes mosquitoes resistant to the dengue virus. Now, a team at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, wants to test whether they can spread Wolbachia in the wild by setting free small numbers of mosquitoes infected with the microbe.