Middle East DVEP - Armed Forces Pest Management Board

imported, and the danger of introducing new strains of Leishmania and other vector-bornediseases is high.d. Water, Living and Sanitary Conditions. Approximately 93% of Saudi Arabia’surban population has access to municipally supplied water. Although chlorinated, thewater is subject to contamination because of poor system maintenance, lack of flow inpipes, and inadequately trained personnel. Saudi Arabia’s sanitary conditions are belowWestern standards. About 54% of Riyadh’s population, but only 30% of the surroundingarea, is connected to the public sewage system. Night soil is commonly used as fertilizer.Indiscriminate dumping is common, and refuse disposal is inadequate throughout mosturban areas and nonexistent in rural areas. Water spillage at some points, along withindiscriminate dumping and waste disposal, can foster locally abundant breeding of certaindisease vectors, vermin, or pest species. Although not as significant a problem as inseveral other Middle Eastern countries, intensely biting vector and pest populations dooccur in Saudi Arabia, and these could impact military operations.L. Syria.a. Geography. Syria has a land area of 184,000 sq km, is slightly larger than NorthDakota, and consists of four physiographic areas: (1) A coastal zone along theMediterranean Sea extends from Turkey to Lebanon for about 180 km, varying in widthfrom 32 km to less than 3 km in the north, and approximately 19 km in the south. (2) Themountainous zone consists of two ranges running parallel to the coast. Jabal an-Nusayriyah is located in the west, with an average elevation of 230 m, some peaksreaching nearly 1,600 m above sea level. The Anti-Lebanon Mountains, with a meanelevation of 2,000 m, are located along the eastern boundary with Lebanon. Mt. Hermonat 2,800 m, the highest point in Syria, is included in this range. (3) Just east of themountains is a high plateau, with a mean elevation of 400 m, which slopes southeastward.The high plateau contains the fertile areas of Aleppo, Hims, Hamah, the Ghab depression,and a 65 km rift known as the Orontes River Valley. (4) South of the high plateau is abarren desert known as the Hamad, which covers about one-third of the country’s area.b. Climate. Syria’s climate varies geographically. The hottest months (July toAugust) produce temperatures that occasionally reach 49 o C in the Hamad Desert and 40 o Cin the western mountains and coastal plain; extreme lows sometimes reach 8 o C in thewestern mountains and 12 o C on the plateau. The coldest months (December to February)produce temperatures that occasionally reach 20 o C and an evening low of –7 o C in theHamad Desert, western mountains, and the plateau. The western coastal plain extremesare about 5 o C warmer. Occasional snow occurs from December through May on the Jabalan-Nusayriyah range, with frost common on the plateau from November through March.The Hamad Desert experiences sandstorms in February through May. Overall, annualrainfall is heaviest in the west, with 1,200 mm per year in Safita, dropping to 341 mm inthe north and less than 100 mm in the southeastern desert.______________________________________________________________________________________Damascus (elevation 610 m)Mean Daily Temperatures ( o C)57