Toxic moth harmful for humans
Since 2019, I have been developing and implementing my own project to study South American toxic moths harmful to humans from the genera Hylesia and Lonomia, starting with H. metabus. Females of all Hylesia species have urticating hairs on their abdomen that are easily detachable and represent a sanitary risk. In particular, they produce unpredictable outbreaks, during which hundreds of moths fly above the cities attracted by their white lights, covering inhabitants, play grounds, house gardens or drying clothes with urticating hairs. This results in dermatitis epidemics, sometimes together with respiratory and ocular symptoms. Despite the sanitary, societal and economical importance of this species, little is known about its ecology and about the ecological causes of its recurrent and unpredictable outbreaks. Similarly, it is hypothesized that current degradations of ecosystems’ health magnify the human health problem caused by Hylesia and that further global changes will worsen it. Hence, we urgently need to advance our ecological knowledge of these problematic species, in order to propose Ecohealth interventions durably targeting the ecological roots of the problem. My project hence proposes i) to characterise intrinsic determinants of problematic species and populations, ii) to examine ecological determinants, in particular ecosystem health degradation, on insects outbreaks, and iii) establish strong and durable bilateral knowledge transfer and partnership with civil society organizations in order to monitor problematic populations and propose locally specific Ecohealth interventions.