A Study on Skin Microbiome, Knowledge and Control of Malaria among Volunteers in Akure– A Malaria Endemic Area, South-West, Nigeria

Abstract

The study was carried out to determine the skin microbial diversity, knowledge and control of malaria among volunteers in Akure. Skin surface of one hundred and fourteen (114) consented participants were swabbed at different locations (elbow, neck, and knee) on the body and examined for the microbial diversities using standard microbiological methods. Socio-demographic characteristics, knowledge and awareness of malaria and mosquito control among the participants were evaluated with the use of multiple choice questioners. The highest number of the participant were within the age range 31-40 years 32(28.1%) followed by age range 11-20 and 21-30 years (17.5%). The number of male and female participants were 67(58.8%) and 47(41.2%) respectively. It was noted that all the participants have heard about malaria before while 60(52.6%) of them have been diagnosed of malaria in the last 6 months, 28.9% of the participants have their personal mosquito repellant as at the time of this investigation while 71.1% did not have mosquito repellant. Bacterial counts (Log10 CFU/cm2) ranged from 5.70±0.13 (neck) to 6.51±0.05 (knee) while the highest fungal counts (Log10 SFU/cm2) was observed in knee (2.80±0.07) followed by elbow (2.61±0.04) and neck (1.91±0.05). Ten (10) bacterial and nine (9) different fungal species were identified as skin microbiome, the most occurred bacterial genus in the skin of the neck, elbow and knee were Staphylococcus (49.36%), Bacillus (42.23%) and Staphylococcus (43.75%) respectively while the most occurred fungal genus were Aspergillus (36.54%), Aspergillus (50%) and Alternaria (18.92%) in the neck, elbow and knee skin respectively. The results of the study will be important for control of malaria in endemic area and the skin microflora isolated could be explored as mosquito repellant to reduce malaria infection in endemic areas.