Regenerating Motivation to Prevent Mosquito Breeding and Implementing a Novel Technology in Residential Spaces in Singapore

Dengue is rapidly spreading in the world today.An additional mosquito control tool is being explored in field trials in Singapore, although a comprehensive mosquito surveillance and control programme has already been in place for many decades.The National Environment Agency, Singapore, has been testing the Wolbachia-Aedes suppression technology at residential areas of Singapore.Evaluation of the technology in Singapore's context has been studied considerably, including gaining a high level of support from local residents for testing of the technology at their residential areas.However, rather less attention has been paid to the underlying motivation amongst local residents to prevent mosquito propagation in their living spaces and the roles of science communications in implementing the technology in society.Our survey on local residents has found negative feelings toward mosquito bites, adoption of official advice, and recognition of own responsibility in preventing mosquito breeding.This research has also attempted to analyse activities that target social implementation of the novel technology from a viewpoint of science communications.We elucidated characteristics that worked in favour of these objectives: the process to ensure consistency, speed in responding to enquiries from local residents, suitability of content when tailoring messages, integrity in honouring scientific evidence, and dynamism from the communicators.The overall results identify the sociopolitical environment in Singapore that facilitates effectual science communications.Direction towards virtual reality and digital society in community education, as well as inclusion of the total population in community engagement, are also discussed.