On 12 June the World Cup will kick off in Brazil and the all of the world will watch their teams compete to win it all, but before that can happen the Brazilian government has problem to tackle so that the players and fans can enjoy the beautiful country that is Brazil. The host country has been facing an increasing outbreak of Dengue fever.
Dengue fever is a very dangerous illness that is transported by mosquitoes to humans and is very common in tropical countries like Brazil. Dengue is spread by the Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. The mosquito has become resistant to insecticides, lives in homes and is most active during the day, which will makes bed nets useless.
To fight these bugs the Brazilian government has decided to use the mosquito against itself, by starting a two year trail of releasing genetically modified mosquitoes into the wild population. These genetically modified mosquitoes have gene that causes them to die young. The government sends pick trucks full of the short lived male mosquitoes with the hopes that they will mate with the female mosquito, which is the one that bites and transfers Dengue fever, and after they mate their offspring will have a short live and help control the spread of the disease.
The Florida Keys is also conducting a similar trail to get rid of Dengue fever and control the mosquito population by using a similar method, but with some slight differences. The Florida Keys is using the The Sterile Insect Technique (SIT), which can be best described as birth control for insects. These Genetically modified mosquitoes are born infertile. They release the infertile male mosquitoes into the wild and the males will compete with the wild males to mate. The hope is that the infertile male mosquitoes will kill the wild male mosquitoes and mate with the female mosquitoes and they won't be able to reproduce.
However many ecologist agree that if we were to kill of the mosquito, that it would not be missed. Many have looked at the environmental impact of killing of the mosquito, because as many might think, killing off entire species could cause some significant damage to the environment. But the mosquito has been shown to only have little impact if it were to disappear. Bird and bats hardly rely on the mosquito as prey, as shown that only 2% of a bat's diet consist of mosquito. And the pollination that many insects contribute in, if the mosquito were to disappear, then something else will step up to the task.
Who knows if getting rid of the mosquito will not be damaging, but controlling it won't be.
Sources and More info
http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-04-25/brazilians-welcome-genetically-modified-mosquito-help-fight-dengue-fever
http://keysmosquito.org/modified-mosquito-release/
http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100721/full/466432a.html
No comments:
Post a Comment