Florida Approves Release of Engineered Mosquitoes

Florida Approves Release of Engineered Mosquitoes to Combat Viral Diseases

Some of the infectious ailments spread by mosquitoes such as yellow fever, Zika, Chikungunya, and dengue are growing concerns in the U.S. and globally. To successfully combat these diseases, you will have to deal with their vectors effectively. Recently, permission was granted to the piloting program in Florida to release genetically modified mosquitoes to the environment. The initiative is to help combat the spread of these infectious diseases.

The proponent of this project is Oxitec which aims at controlling and combating insect pests such as the medflies, mosquitoes, and diamondback moths. The project has been fully supported by the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District Board of Commissioners (“FKMCD”). The project is now going to be brought to reality after ten years of thorough planning.

Oxitec is planning to release male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes that are homozygous for self-limiting genes to the environment. After the Oxitec males mosquitoes are released in the environment, they will fertilize the female breeding mosquitoes. After fertilization, the gene will be adopted by both mosquitoes of which they will all turn out to be heterozygous. The female species will eventually die while the male will continue living. They will continue mating with other female progenies till the female species inherit 50% of their genes.

The remaining 50% of the female mosquitoes will maintain their population since they will not be affected by these male species. However, it would be best if you asked yourself this critical question; how many times will the male species be released to make this population control strategy essential in controlling these vectors?

Field trials have been performed by Oxitec in Brazil and Cayman Islands and have indicated that the method can be more productive. But you should ask yourself, will the strategy be useful in large areas like the Florida Keys or the whole Florida State? An additional question that you should also think about is that how many male specie mosquitoes will be required to run the project successfully? And how much will it cost for the program to be efficient?

However, the project will pave ways for other technologies that may make good impacts on these problems. One area that will have to be improved from the project is the removal of antibiotics from the procedure. It was noted that Oxitec mosquitoes were bred with the help of tetracycline to suppress the self-limiting gene. Tetracycline presence in the breeding of male mosquitoes could tamper with their fitness; hence more mosquitoes will be required for the process to be effective. If the project by Oxitec fails to succeed, it will be more cumbersome for other approaches of mosquito controls to be successful.

Another researcher has also developed the sterile insect technique (“SIT”), which is capable of producing 100% sterile male species that are also fit enough. The technology has demonstrated that it does not need antibiotics and can also be released in the form of eggs. The eggs can also be preserved for at least a year before being released. By combining these two technologies, controlling vectors can be successful, hence bringing a reduction in the diseases being spread by mosquitoes. The disease burden facing humanity is likely to go down if this project, together with the work being done by companies like Genprex Inc. (NASDAQ: GNPX) yields positive outcomes.

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