All of these diseases are present or have been present in Louisiana. Many other diseases are also transmitted by the bite of a mosquito throughout the tropics. Malaria is the number one insect-borne killer of humans. It affects 270 million people worldwide and results in almost 2 million deaths yearly. The World Health Organization estimates that malaria accounts for 1 million deaths of infants and young children in Africa each year.
Malaria is still present in parts of the U.S., but at very low levels.
Mosquito control efforts have kept the U.S. infection rate at only one or two new cases per year. Periodic Yellow Fever epidemics swept through southern U.S. cities throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. The last major outbreak in the U.S. occurred in New Orleans in 1905. The species of mosquito that spread yellow fever, malaria, and dengue are common in Louisiana. However, the pathogens themselves are not currently present.