The scale of the effort is considerable. For the tsetse component, the team assembled 3,087 trapping records from 2,864 distinct trapping locations, covering 26,121 flies caught in the field. On the disease side, 740 herd-level records were compiled from 393 survey sites, encompassing 26,653 animals tested for infection. Before this work, such data existed only in fragmented form, held in project reports, ministry archives and the memories of field veterinarians. In most endemic countries, information on where tsetse flies occur and where trypanosomosis strikes is available only at the country level, poorly harmonized and effectively unusable for rigorous spatial analysis. The Ghanaian team set out to change that, standardizing every record, assigning coordinates where possible and centralizing everything in one database.

The atlas confirms that both the vector and the disease remain widespread across Ghana, but it also reveals a strikingly uneven picture. Of the ten tsetse species historically reported from the country, only three were detected in the compiled records: Glossina tachinoides, Glossina palpalis and Glossina morsitans. Each occupies a distinct ecological niche. G. palpalis, a riverine species favoring the shaded vegetation along watercourses, is the only one with a truly country-wide distribution. G. tachinoides, also riverine but more tolerant of drier conditions, is concentrated in the northern reaches of the country. G. morsitans, a savanna species, survives only in smaller, fragmented populations that are mainly confined to protected areas, a pattern that suggests habitat change has squeezed this species into refuges where woodland and wildlife persist.

That contraction of G. morsitans is more than a curiosity of biogeography. Tsetse flies are the sole biological vectors of trypanosomes, the single-celled parasites that cause African animal trypanosomosis, known historically as nagana. The disease remains a major constraint to sustainable livestock production and food security across vast areas of sub-Saharan Africa, depressing milk yields, causing weight loss and infertility, and killing animals outright in acute infections. Where the fly goes, the parasite follows, and where the fly retreats, farmers gain the chance to keep more productive breeds of cattle that would otherwise quickly sicken. Mapping the vector with precision is therefore the first step in any rational control strategy, because it tells decision-makers exactly where interventions will pay off and where they are unnecessary.

The atlas also documents a rare success story. In the Upper West region, major tsetse control operations were carried out in 2010, and the reductions in fly densities achieved then appear to have been sustained over the following years. Sustained suppression of a tsetse population is notoriously difficult, since the insects are highly mobile and can recolonize cleared areas from neighboring territories. The persistence of the Upper West gains suggests that the combination of methods deployed there, and the ecological conditions of the region, allowed control benefits to endure. For a country weighing the costs of renewed campaigns, that kind of longitudinal evidence, drawn directly from the atlas’s time-stamped trapping records, is exactly the sort of information that has been missing from national planning.

On the disease side, the atlas paints a picture dominated by cattle, which account for almost 90 percent of the collected data. The average prevalence of bovine trypanosomosis measured with the buffy coat technique, a microscopic method that concentrates parasites from blood samples for direct observation, is 7.7 percent, based on 825 positive animals out of 10,766 tested. The buffy coat technique was applied to more than two thirds of the randomly selected samples, making it the backbone of the national prevalence estimate. But the atlas’s numbers also expose a well-known technical trap in trypanosomosis epidemiology: the apparent prevalence of the disease depends heavily on the diagnostic tool used to detect it.

More sensitive but less frequently deployed diagnostics tell a different story. Antibody-detecting enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays, which reveal past exposure to trypanosomes rather than active infection, returned a prevalence of 22 percent, with 720 positives among 3,277 samples. Polymerase chain reaction, which amplifies parasite DNA and can detect infections that microscopy misses, measured 17 percent, with 332 positives among 1,949 samples. The gap between these figures and the buffy coat result is not a contradiction but a lesson in method: microscopic examination only catches infections with enough parasites circulating in the blood to be seen, while serology and molecular tools cast a wider net. For planners, the atlas’s side-by-side presentation of these estimates provides a realistic range within which the true burden of the disease lies, and a reminder that comparisons between regions or years must always account for the diagnostic method used.

The atlas is not a one-off publication but a living instrument. The database was already developed by 2018 and has been regularly updated ever since, and it now serves as the pillar of data management for the Tsetse and Trypanosomosis Control Unit. Crucially, it is being used to measure and drive the country’s progress along the progressive control pathway for African animal trypanosomosis, a staged framework endorsed by international bodies that guides endemic countries from ad hoc, localized interventions toward coordinated, area-wide suppression and, ultimately, elimination of the disease where feasible. By quantifying where flies persist and where infection rates fall, the atlas gives Ghana an objective yardstick for each step of that journey, replacing anecdote and optimism with georeferenced evidence.

The open data policy accompanying the atlas multiplies its potential impact. The full database has been released as supplementary material, allowing researchers, modelers and control programs within and beyond Ghana to interrogate the records, build predictive maps, and design targeted studies. This matters beyond Ghana’s borders: tsetse flies and the trypanosomes they carry affect more than three dozen African countries, and national atlases of this kind, when combined, could support continental-scale analyses of vector distribution and disease risk under changing climates and land use. Ghana’s experience also offers a template for other endemic nations whose data remain scattered, showing that decades of routine fieldwork can be rescued from obscurity and turned into a strategic asset.

The initiative was funded primarily by the Government of Ghana through its support to the control unit, with assistance from the Food and Agriculture Organization under the Programme Against African Trypanosomosis, backing from the Government of Italy, support from the Gates Foundation for the atlas’s finalization and publication, and technical cooperation from the International Atomic Energy Agency related to the sterile insect technique as a component of area-wide tsetse management. For the farmers of northern Ghana whose cattle face the daily threat of infection, the atlas may seem an abstract achievement. But its authors argue the opposite: knowing precisely where the enemy stands is the foundation of every practical victory to come, and after thirty years of data, Ghana finally has the map.

Subject of Research: Mapping tsetse fly distribution and African animal trypanosomosis prevalence in Ghana using a national georeferenced database

Article Title: A national atlas of tsetse flies and African animal trypanosomosis in Ghana

Article References: Anderson, B., Adam, Y., Mahama, C., Sakara, Y., Sottie, E., Paone, M., & Cecchi, G. (2026). A national atlas of tsetse flies and African animal trypanosomosis in Ghana. Parasites & Vectors. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13071-026-07725-2

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1186/s13071-026-07725-2

Keywords: tsetse flies, Glossina, African animal trypanosomosis, Ghana, livestock, parasitology, GIS, atlas, epidemiology, vector control, food security, FAO

Antimicrobial resistance, commonly abbreviated as AMR, occurs when bacteria, viruses or other microorganisms evolve the ability to withstand treatments such as antibiotics that would normally kill them or stop their growth. In aquaculture, the farming of fish, crustaceans, molluscs and other aquatic organisms, the emergence of resistant pathogens is a particular concern because intensive production systems can create conditions in which disease spreads rapidly and antimicrobials are used to control outbreaks. When resistant organisms develop in aquatic environments, they can move through water, food chains and human contact, complicating treatment of infections in animals and people alike. Responsible antimicrobial use, coupled with strong biosecurity measures that prevent disease from entering or spreading within farms, is therefore regarded internationally as a cornerstone of sustainable aquatic food production.

Mississippi State University brings a long institutional history to this role. As a land-grant university with leading expertise in fisheries and aquaculture, veterinary medicine and international food security, it has worked with FAO on antimicrobial use and antimicrobial resistance, aquaculture biosecurity and aquatic animal health. The renewal of the reference centre designation signals that the organization’s reviewers judged the university’s contributions during the first designation period to have met the standards expected of a centre that provides authoritative scientific advice to FAO and its member nations. The agreement positions the university to continue supplying the technical competencies needed to strengthen capacity development efforts worldwide.

University President Mark E. Keenum said he looks forward to the institution continuing this important work under the renewed agreement. According to Keenum, the renewal means the university will continue to provide the scientific expertise and technical competencies needed to strengthen capacity development efforts that support FAO’s work in promoting the responsible use of antimicrobials in aquaculture and reducing the risks associated with antimicrobial resistance. He added that Mississippi State will also continue to support FAO’s efforts to advance responsible aquaculture practices and strengthen aquaculture biosecurity worldwide, framing the partnership as an extension of the university’s land-grant mission into the international arena.

The renewal was marked in person at FAO headquarters in Rome, where Mississippi State Provost and Executive Vice President David Shaw and other university leaders met with officials on September 22 as part of a broader agri-food systems conference. The discussions focused on building more resilient food systems, a theme that has grown in urgency as aquatic foods supply an increasing share of animal protein for a growing global population while facing mounting pressures from disease, environmental change and intensifying production. The Rome meeting provided an opportunity to align the centre’s next five-year work programme with FAO’s strategic priorities on antimicrobial resistance and biosecure aquaculture.

Shaw emphasized the interconnected nature of the challenges the centre addresses. He noted that issues related to food security, animal health, environmental stewardship and human well-being are often deeply intertwined, even when institutions attempt to address them separately, and that aquatic food systems provide a particularly compelling example of those connections. In his view, the university’s experience in aquaculture, veterinary medicine and international food-security initiatives has repeatedly reinforced why collaborative, multidisciplinary approaches are essential. Addressing antimicrobial resistance, he said, requires scientists, veterinarians, producers, policymakers, regulators, environmental specialists and public health experts to work together across disciplines and sectors rather than in isolation.

Shaw also argued that universities carry a responsibility that goes beyond generating knowledge. As a land-grant institution, Mississippi State believes strongly that universities must connect expertise across disciplines and translate that knowledge into practical solutions for producers and communities. He described antimicrobial resistance as a reminder that complex challenges demand integrated approaches, and he identified a central lesson that the partnership with FAO highlights: the most effective response to disease is often prevention. That principle, in which biosecurity and good husbandry reduce the need for antimicrobial treatment in the first place, sits at the heart of the reference centre’s technical philosophy.

Stephen Reichley, who heads the FAO Reference Centre and serves as associate director of the Global Center for Aquatic Health and Food Security, said the redesignation recognizes the university’s continuing contributions at the intersection of aquatic animal health, antimicrobial stewardship, aquaculture biosecurity, food security and One Health. The One Health framework, which treats human, animal and environmental health as inseparable, has become the dominant lens through which international agencies approach antimicrobial resistance, since resistant organisms and the genes that confer resistance can circulate among people, livestock, wildlife, water and soil. Reichley noted that the work also reinforces the university’s role in supporting both the United States aquaculture sector and international efforts to build sustainable, biosecure aquatic food systems.

Reichley described the five-year redesignation as a reflection of FAO’s continued confidence in Mississippi State and, more importantly, as another opportunity to put the university’s expertise to work on challenges that affect producers and food systems around the world. By connecting research, diagnostics, education and extension, he said, the centre can help prevent aquatic animal disease, promote responsible antimicrobial use and strengthen aquaculture biosecurity from Mississippi to the global level. That combination of laboratory science, field diagnostics and outreach is characteristic of the land-grant model, in which discoveries move from research settings into the hands of farmers, veterinarians and regulators who can apply them.

The measurable record of the first designation period underlines the scale of that contribution. Between 2022 and the renewal, Mississippi State reported 47 scientific papers on antimicrobial resistance and aquatic biosecurity to FAO, along with 139 presentations and more than 30 research projects that advanced understanding of AMR in aquatic environments and improved aquaculture biosecurity practices. Those outputs fed directly into FAO’s mission of providing authoritative advice to its member nations, informing guidance on how farms can reduce disease risk through stocking density management, water quality control, vaccination, diagnostic surveillance and other preventive measures that limit the need for antimicrobials. With the agreement now extended through October 2031, the centre is positioned to build on that foundation at a moment when demand for aquatic protein is rising and the global fight against antimicrobial resistance has never been more consequential. Ongoing workshops and events connected to the centre’s work are listed through the Global Center for Aquatic Health and Food Security, offering producers, researchers and policymakers continuing avenues to engage with the science of biosecure, responsible aquaculture.

Subject of Research: Renewal of an FAO reference centre designation for research on antimicrobial resistance and biosecurity in aquaculture

Article Title: FAO renews university's designation as Reference Centre on Antimicrobial Resistance and Aquaculture Biosecurity

Article References: FAO renews university's designation as Reference Centre on Antimicrobial Resistance and Aquaculture Biosecurity. (n.d.). Original publication

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: Not provided

Keywords: antimicrobial resistance, aquaculture, biosecurity, FAO, Mississippi State University, aquatic animal health, One Health, food security, antimicrobial stewardship, global center for aquatic health and food security, sustainable aquaculture, fish health