English company Oxitec has released a simple, easy to distribute commercial product they say cuts Dengue Fever spreading mosquito populations by 96%. By just adding water, genetically modified mosquito eggs mature into males whose sperm cannot result in viable female larvae.
prnewswire.comSubmitted by lughnasadh t3_yortnc in Futurology
lughnasadh OP t1_ivfh008 wrote
Submission Statement
This is great news, but it's worth remembering that of the 725,000 human deaths every year from mosquitoes, 600,000 of those are from malaria, and this technique doesn't work with the mosquitoes that cause it.
Still, what is hopeful about this technique is that it's so cheap and easy to operate. The boxes with the eggs can be easily distributed and take no special knowledge to operate. It really is as simple as just adding the right amount of water to the right schedule.