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Genetically Engineered Malaria-Resistant Mosquito
David_Bloom writes "According to this Yahoo! News article, a team of German and American genenetic engineering experts have successfully created a malaria-resistant mosquito. Sounds good, but the scientists are still unsure about how to actually apply this to the world's large mosquito population."
Just make sure that you're only bitten by these malaria-resistant mosquitoes.
Wonder if it's possible if they could introduce this new species in the old environment and have it wipe out the old kind. That's what they do with killer bees, they replace the killer queen with a homely queen and all the bees born thereafter and normal and well-adjusted.
I have been pwned because my
Maybe they can further enhance the mosquitoes to produce an opiate-like substance that gets injected into the bloodstream of its victims. I'm not sure of the *practical* uses of such a mosquito, but man, it sure would be fun in the summer time near the swamp!
You know, I can put this liquid on my dog's skin and for three months, he's immune to fleas. Completely immune - they die if they touch him. Why isn't there something like this for humans?
Personally, I favor pulling back to suborbital range, saturation bombing the planet with DEET until it's livable, and then coming back.
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This is reminiscent of this discussion about "releasing massive numbers of tsetse flies 'sterilized by a burst of radiation' into sub Saharan Africa" back in February.
This reminds me of a diferent approach used to eradicate the tse-tse fly, wherein large quantities of sterile males are introduced into the wild population. This reduces the aggregate number of births; apparently, this almost destorys the tse-tse population over a 3-year period. Slashdot had a story on this awhile ago; google gives more comprehensive links.
If the human population keeps growing and searching for ways to fight diseases, they'll get back at us. Think of MRSA for example; all we need is time and enough administered vancomycin (our last resort against several multiple resistant bacteria) to induce complete resistance of pathogens against current antibiotics.
I hear what you're that we should be cautious with science and intraducing populations of organisms (ie Gypsy Moth) -- but to stop searching for cures to diesase is far from the right answer.
What do you suggest we do? Just bend over and let disease flatten populations? Is it OK that we not fight a disease it its not in our backyard, or if most of the people afflicted are not the right color or relegion? What disease is worth fighting? AIDS? Cancer? Malaria has killed more than both put together. More reasearch has been performed on malaria than most diseases -- agian, you might be right that care should be taken, but this is one that is definitely worth fighting.
What is comes down to is quality of life. If it weren't for medical science, we would still be dying in our early 40's. Medical science is not our enemy.
-Turkey
-Turkey
Skilef,
I completely agree with where you are coming from...but the article that you link to in your post quotes the scientists specifically paying regard to your concern. Depending on their review process, I don't think that they're necessarily jumping into anything.
However, the scientists, including Dr Andrea Crisanti at Imperial College London, UK, say there would need to be a full political, ethical and scientific review before any such genetically-modified animals were released into the environment.
This point was emphasised by Chris Curtis, professor of medical entomology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
"I think one should have concern for the remote possibility that the modifications could make the mosquitoes able to carry a virus that they cannot carry at present," he told the BBC.
See what I mean?
-Turkey
-Turkey
If they want mosquitos gone, they should convince RIAA executives that in the next 5 years, a mosquito might be used by someone to copy a 'hit single' for a friend.
They should genetically engineer malaria-resistant humans instead, right?
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