Dengue virusAccording to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the technique has been used in Brazil, Panama and India, and as of 2019, nearly a billion mosquitoes have been released into the air worldwide.
The African country of Djibouti has used a unique method to fight malaria by releasing thousands of mosquitoes into the air.
These mosquitoes have been genetically modified by the British biotechnology company Oxytech and they do not bite, but their genetics have been changed in such a way that they kill the female mosquito before it grows up.
It should be noted that only female mosquitoes spread malaria and other viral diseases in humans.
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the technique has been used in Brazil, Panama and India, and as of 2019, nearly a billion mosquitoes have been released into the air worldwide.
Mosquitoes were released in a suburb of the city on Thursday in Djibouti, which was made possible by a partnership between OxyTech and the Djibouti government, as well as a non-governmental organization.
“We’ve created mosquitoes that don’t bite and don’t spread disease, and when we release them into the air, they seek out the substance and attach to wild-type mosquitoes,” OxyTech chief executive Gray Frandsen told the BBC. are.’
The genetics of these laboratory-grown mosquitoes have been altered in such a way that the offspring of the female mosquito cannot survive for long.
Only the male mosquito survives, but according to the scientists behind the project, they also die after a certain time.
The project in Djibouti was launched two years ago to eradicate the mosquito species ‘Anopheles stephenzi’ which appeared in 2012.
Importantly, Djibouti was on the verge of eliminating malaria when suddenly 30 new cases were reported and the number of malaria cases in the country reached 73,000 in 2020.
This mosquito species is now found in six more African countries, including Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, Sudan, Nigeria and Ghana.
Stephanzi is native to Asia and is very difficult to control. It is also called the mosquito of the urban area because traditional methods of eliminating mosquitoes have no effect on them.
This mosquito attacks humans both day and night and is not killed by insecticides.
Dr. Abdullah Ahmed Abidi, the president’s health advisor in Djibouti, told the Financial Times news website that his government’s goal is to end the malaria epidemic in Djibouti that has been on the rise for a decade.
Director of non-governmental organization Association Mutualis, Dr. Bo Abidi says, “Until recently, malaria was very rare in our population.” We are now seeing malaria patients on a daily basis and there is a dire and urgent need for new types of action against them.
Because of Djibouti’s small size, it was easy to start a malaria campaign here, with a population of only 1 million.
Sada Ismail, a malaria sufferer who has now recovered and was part of the campaign, told the BBC: ‘Malaria is a disease that affects our health and people are waiting to be cured. How can we win this war with the help of mosquitoes?’
The issue of genetic modification in Africa has been controversial and environmental groups and activists have warned of its negative effects.
OxyTech claims that there have been no adverse effects on human health or the environment in the past 10 years from its manufactured mosquitoes, and that a billion mosquitoes have been released into the air during that time.
“Our aim is to ensure that whatever is released into the air is safe and effective,” he says. It has no impact on the environment.
The company says that even if these mosquitoes bite a human, it will have no effect.
“It’s a new solution that may be controversial, but it’s the future,” says Dr. Abdi.
If the experiment is successful, it will continue to release mosquitoes on a larger scale into the next year.
It should be noted that 600,000 people die annually due to malaria worldwide and nine out of every 10 deaths occur in Africa.
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