Asymptomatic humans transmit dengue virus to mosquitoes.
Three-quarters of the estimated 390 million dengue virus (DENV) infections each year are clinically inapparent. People with inapparent dengue virus infections are generally considered dead-end hosts for transmission because they do not reach sufficiently high viremia levels to infect mosquitoes. Here, we show that, despite their lower average level of viremia, asymptomatic people can be infectious to mosquitoes. Moreover, at a given level of viremia, DENV-infected people with no detectable symptoms or before the onset of symptoms are significantly more infectious to mosquitoes than people with symptomatic infections. Because DENV viremic people without clinical symptoms may be exposed to more mosquitoes through their undisrupted daily routines than sick people and represent the bulk of DENV infections, our data indicate that they have the potential to contribute significantly more to virus transmission to mosquitoes than previously recognized.
['Duong|Veasna|V|', 'Lambrechts|Louis|L|', 'Paul|Richard E|RE|', 'Ly|Sowath|S|', 'Lay|Rath Srey|RS|', 'Long|Kanya C|KC|', 'Huy|Rekol|R|', 'Tarantola|Arnaud|A|', 'Scott|Thomas W|TW|', 'Sakuntabhai|Anavaj|A|', 'Buchy|Philippe|P|']
D000293:Adolescent D000330:Aedes D000818:Animals D002648:Child D003715:Dengue D003716:Dengue Virus D004306:Dose-Response Relationship, Immunologic D005260:Female D006801:Humans D008297:Male D015999:Multivariate Analysis D012044:Regression Analysis D014766:Viremia
dengue Aedes aegypti Cambodia human-to-mosquito transmission mosquito experimental infection