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Article History

Received: 8 January 2025

Accepted: 25 September 2025

First Online: 11 November 2025

Declarations

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: All experiments were performed in accordance with relevant guidelines and regulations (such as the Declaration of Helsinki).” The study adheres to the principles of the ethical institutions which aligns with the Declaration of Helsinki core guidelines. This includes obtaining informed consent, minimizing risks, ensuring a favorable risk–benefit ratio, and protecting the rights and well-being of participants, especially vulnerable groups. Moreover, each schoolchild had given his assent to participate and parents or legal guardians had provided a written informed consent before starting the data collection.Due to different regulatory institutions and the delay in data collection date in the two regions of interest, two Ethical approval were obtained for this study. The first ethical (N°53/MS/DC/SGM/CNERS/SA ) approval was obtained in 2022 from the National Ethics Committee for Health Research located in Akpakpa (Cotonou) which we used for data collection in June 2022 in the southern. The second was obtained, in August 2024, from the Ethics Research Committee of Applied Biomedical Sciences (N° 60/MS/DC/SGM/CNERS/SA) located in Gbegamey (Cotonou) for data collection in the north. Moreover, each schoolchild had given his assent to participate and parents or legal guardians had provided a written informed consent before starting the data collection.

: Not applicable.

: The authors declare no competing interests.