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Two US scientists have proposed a new answer to the Zika epidemic: a sex-change operation for the mosquito that spreads the virus and other diseases. This genetic modification would turn deadly, blood-drinking females into harmless, nectar-sipping males.
The solution could potentially be used to limit not just Zika but malaria, dengue, yellow fever and other mosquito-borne infections such as chikungunya. However, the researchers accept there is a long way to go before the technique could be used in the field.
Since the spread of the Zika infection carried by the Aedes aegypti mosquito from Africaacross the Pacific to Brazil, Colombia and other Latin American nations, the British House of Lords has recommended new investment in GM weaponry, and the World Health Organisation in Geneva this week called for both “old and new approaches” to mosquito control.
Zach Adelman of Virginia Tech and his co-author Zhijan Tu, report in the journal Trends in Parasitology that a new discovery offers the promise of reducing or eliminating infection rates in all mosquito-borne infections
The duo last year reported the identification of the first male-determining factor in mosquitoes. If this gene was turned on in female embryos, they developed male genitalia.
Read full, original post: Genetic sex change for mosquitoes could stop the spread of Zika
