The research projects
Chikungunya epidemic in la Réunion: The "tiger mosquito" extends its range
January 2006
Chikungunya is a viral infection transmitted by mosquitoes. It affects thousands of people in the Indian Ocean, India and Central Africa. In 2006, an outbreak of unprecedented scale struck La Réunion and other islands in the southwest of the Indian Ocean. This prompted researchers from the IRD ...
Ciguatera, a new hazard for the intertropical zone
January 2001
Occurring throughout the tropics, ciguatera is a form of food poisoning caused by eating certain species of fish contaminated with toxins from micro-algae that live on coral reefs. 100,000 cases of severe poisoning are recorded every year. The symptoms are gastrointestinal and neurological: ...
Diagnosing nutritional vulnerability in Burkina Faso
January 2005
In the Sahel countries, it is a constant challenge to identify the most vulnerable populations so as to prevent food crises and malnutrition. Research by the IRD in Burkina Faso may help to address the challenge. Nutritionists and epidemiologists have shown that analysing dietary diversity in ...
Genetic susceptibility to sleeping sickness
January 2001
African human trypanosomiasis, a parasite disease transmitted by a tsetse fly’s bite, is a widespread problem in sub-Saharan Africa. Although the alarming upsurge recorded over the past 20 years seems to have been halted, the illness still threatens millions of people and some countries could ...
Identifying reservoirs and genetic lineages of the Ebola and Marburg viruses
January 1999
The devastating haemorrhagic fevers caused by viruses of the Filoviridae family in Africa have been known for some thirty years. These viruses, harboured by fruit bats and transmitted to humans, have caused deadly epidemics resulting in hundreds of deaths. To develop vaccines and protect the ...
Intermittent preventive treatment against malaria: fresh hope for children
January 2005
Malaria kills one to three million people a year worldwide, most of them in tropical Africa. It is the foremost cause of infant death in the Sahelian zone, especially among under-fives, and increasing drug resistance is making this situation worse. New anti-malaria treatments and fresh ...
Synergy between insecticide and repellent to combat malaria-carrying mosquitoes
January 2007
With 40% of the world’s population, mainly in the poorest countries, exposed to malaria risk and over 500 million people falling ill with the disease each year, it is still the most worrying tropical parasite disease. Most deaths from malaria occur in sub-Saharan Africa and most of those who die ...
Tracking the source of the AIDS virus
January 2002
By showing that the chimpanzee is the natural reservoir of the virus that has caused the AIDS pandemic, and by discovering that the gorilla also carries a virus closely related to HIV-1, IRD scientists have pinned down the origin of the AIDS virus and confirmed that it has been transmitted ...
