What’s the buzz: Taking a look at insectaries

The world is, quite literally, full of insects. And this, according to Elizabeth Weisenberg, a laboratory planner with CUH2A, is an important reason to pay attention to them.

Arthropods, characterized by a hard exoskeleton and a segmented body, make up 80 percent of the animal species, Weisenberg said in her recent TurnKey ‘07 session entitled “The Latest Buzz: Insectaries.” And more importantly, insects are common vectors for disease.

For this reason, insectaries – facilities researching arthropod borne diseases – are an important tool in fighting such deadly maladies.

Among the most deadly, according to Weisenberg:

• Between three and five million fatal cases of Malaria occur each year. Of those, 90 percent are found in Africa, and one million of the fatal cases occur in children under the age of five.
• Leishmaniasis affects roughly 12 million people every year.

“Although there aren’t many cases found in the Unites States, there is a rise in Leishmania,” Weisenberg said.

• Dengue Fever is transmitted by mosquito, found in the middle east, and affects 100 million people annually. There is no vaccine available. If contracted a second time, it turns into Hemorraghic Fever.
• Q Fever is a zoonotic, bacterial infection. It is on the list of select agents, and is sometimes transmitted by the tick.
• 18 million people are infected with Chagas disease every year. It is transmitted via the ‘kissing bug’ – Triatominae – and first came to light while being used in research in El Salvador in 1915.

“This is a perfect example of what not to have happen with an insectary environment,” Weisenberg said. “This ‘kissing bug’ actually escaped, and since then El Salvador, Central America, has had difficulty keeping Chagas disease under control.”

Because of incidents such as the release of Chagas disease in particular, it’s important to be aware of these occurrences when planning an insectary.

“When we design insectaries it’s really important to look at what makes these arthropods comfortable, how to make their life styles and their life cycle continue,” Weisenberg said. “That’s one of the things we look at: Who are we trying to make comfortable.”

When planning an insectary, each situation calls for specific needs and requirements. For example, she said, with mosquitoes, only the female needs a blood meal, while the male “couldn’t care less.”

There are four levels in the arthropod containment guideline:

• Level one is the uninfected arthropod
• Level two is for those that have been infected with a BSL-2 agent, and those that have been genetically modified.
• Level three is for those infected with a BSL-3 agent.
• ACL 4 is for those infected with a BS-4 agent.

“We look at risk assessment because our major concern is we don’t want these critters getting out of their home,” Weisenberg said.

If one should escape, lab administrators must investigate several things immediately: They must determine if the arthropod is infected or not; If the arthropod escapes, whether it will be happy when it escapes; And finally, if there is an ability for the escaped arthropod to transmit a disease.

“If a disease hasn’t prevalent in an area, and there’s a way it can become prevalent with this bug that got out, that’s a major concern,” she said. “That’s a risk factor.”

For this reason, Weisenberg stresses the importance being conservative when constructing these facilities.