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Domagoj Hackenberger

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Is the total eradication of mosquitoes a true solution?

Mosquitoes have a massive ecological role in nature. Especially as main food source for great number freshwater fish and birds.

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Topics: balance biology ecology mosquitoes population
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    Allan Macdougall 30+

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    Jan 14 2013: The sickle-cell genetic mutation occuring naturally in human blood cells in malaria regions, is an indication that a natural resistance to malaria is possible.

    This has obviously taken thousands of years in indigenous populations to evolve in the blood, but nonetheless shows that resistance to malaria might potentially be modified by engineering our own resistance, rather than by wrecking yet another important ecosystem to which mosquitos belong.

    Research in Kenya, where sickle-cell has developed as a 'trait' rather than as a pathology, has been shown to confer resistance on populations in this region where malaria is rife:

    http://malaria.wellcome.ac.uk/doc_WTD023878.html

    However, there are caveats to genetically modifying human immune responses via something similar to sickle-cell. One is that its over-development can cause anemia, lung problems and strokes. Secondly, Westerners visiting malaria regions would still have to rely on prophylaxes, which can be unreliable and whose efficacy can be finite.

    My opinion is that modifying human resistance with what nature has shown us, is the way to go.

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