Dengue Outbreak Response during COVID-19 Pandemic, Key Largo, Florida, USA, 2020

Abstract

We report a dengue outbreak in Key Largo, Florida, USA, from February through August 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic. Successful community engagement resulted in 61% of case-patients self-reporting. We also describe COVID-19 pandemic effects on the dengue outbreak investigation and the need to increase clinician awareness of dengue testing recommendations.

Keywords: COVID-19; DENV; Dengue; Florida; SARS-CoV-2; United States; coronavirus disease; dengue virus; respiratory infections; severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2; vector-borne infections; viruses; zoonoses.

Figure 1

Timeline of dengue outbreak response during COVID-19 pandemic, Key Largo, Florida, USA, 2020. Timeline shows number of dengue cases, dengue virus RT-PCR–positive mosquito pools, and events per week during January 26–August 20, 2020. RT-PCR, reverse transcription PCR.

Figure 2

Phylogenetic reconstruction of dengue virus 1 from a dengue outbreak response during COVID-19 pandemic, Key Largo, Florida, USA, 2020. A) Central American lineage, 1986–2014; B) Caribbean lineage, 2008–2020. Maximum-likelihood tree of genotype V was inferred by using envelope gene sequences representing the Central American and Caribbean lineages. Red text indicates sequences obtained in this study. Sequence FL-Miami_human_2020 was obtained from a Miami-Dade County resident with recent travel history to Cuba. We obtained 2 sequences (GenBank accession nos. OM909246 and OM909247) from the National Reference Laboratory for Arboviruses, French Armed Forces Biomedical Research Institute, Bretigny-sur-Orge, France. Scale bar indicates nucleotide substitutions per site.