Fighting dengue with GM

Nov 15, 2010 |

IANS

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London, Nov. 14: Scientists have released three million genetically-modified mosquitoes in the Cayman Islands to fight dengue fever.

Batches of the male mosquitoes were released in a 40-acre area, to mate with wild female counterparts of the same species, so they wouldn’t be able to produce any offspring. Only female mosquitoes bite humans and spread the disease.

By August, mosquito numbers in that region dropped by 80 per cent compared with a neighbouring area where no sterile male mosquitoes were released, the Daily Mail reported.

Researchers at Oxitec Limited, an Oxford-based company in Britain, created sterile male mosquitoes by manipulating the insects’ DNA.

Anything that could selectively remove insects transmitting really nasty diseases would be very helpful, he said, according to the journal PLOS Biology.

Dengue is a potentially fatal mosquito-borne disease with no treatment or vaccine that can cause fever, muscle and joint pain, and hemorrhagic bleeding.

More than 2.5 billion people are at risk as per the World Health Organisation estimates.

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