Reduced human-biting preferences of the African malaria vectors Anopheles arabiensis and Anopheles gambiae in an urban context: controlled, competitive host-preference experiments in Tanzania.

Urban An. arabiensis had a stronger preference for cattle than the rural population and urban An. gambiae s.s. showed no clear preference for either humans or cattle. In the urban setting, both species exhibited stronger tendencies to attack cattle than previous studies of the same species in rural contexts. Cattle keeping may, therefore, particularly limit the impact of human-targeted vector control interventions in Dar es Salaam and perhaps in other African towns and cities.