The good mosquito versus the bad
The good mosquito versus the bad
Tags: Aedes, Dengue, Genetic biocontrol, North America, Oxitec, Population suppression, Self limiting, Sterile insect technique (SIT)D. Datta, Business Standard, 2020.
Florida will embark on a gigantic biological experiment in 2021. The outcomes, whatever they are, will influence global public health and environmental policy. The danger is, this is on the kind of scale where negative impacts could be irreversible.
Starting 2021, around 750 million genetically modified (GM) Aedes Aegypti mosquitoes will be released in batches into the Florida Keys. These insects are all male, which means they won’t bite humans. Only pregnant female mosquitoes bite — the female of the species is genuinely more deadly than the male.
