The use of fine nets to prevent the breeding of mosquitoes on dry farmland in southern Taiwan.

Objectives: The stagnate water stored in buckets traditionally used by farmers in southern Taiwan to irrigate their dry farmland, serves as favorable breeding ground for Aedes aegypti, the vector of the dengue virus. The public health bureau there distributed fine nets to the farmers to cover their buckets to reduce vector breeding sites. The goal of this study was to compare the container index (CI) in Alian and Tianliao Townships, Kaohsiung County in southern Taiwan over a 2-year period, for 1 year before the fine nets were distributed and 1 year after.